


Probably. Maybe. Almost.

by authordean



Category: Community (TV)
Genre: (All Canon), Canon Ships Applied, Canon Universe, College, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Living Together, Original Character(s), Other Ships Not Mentioned in Tags, Pining, Secret Crush, Slow Build, Studying
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-06
Updated: 2016-04-24
Packaged: 2018-04-19 07:20:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 49,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4737605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/authordean/pseuds/authordean
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Annie and Abed; best friends, room mates, almost lovers. The untold story of their romance, following the plot of Community; showing all their secret meetings, unsaid words, and hidden feelings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Pilot

**Author's Note:**

> Annie and Abed's love story behind the scenes and on screen. Every moment the show didn't explain, and every plot line left untouched is followed. Each chapter is an episode of the show, with added sections involving Annie and Abed. // This is an Annie and Abed story, but all relationships from the show are touched upon as I'm sticking to the canon Universe.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abed and Annie meet for the first time. They make excellent study partners.

 

Annie takes a deep breath as she walks around campus, smiling at people who walk past her. Her eyes scan each person, looking for someone from her Riverside, or even rehab as a nervous habit. But there's no one. She's entirely new here. 

 

There's dreadful music playing from the speakers as she sits down onto the grass, her bag laying against her bare legs. She takes a notepad out, doodling along the edges of the paper as she goes over her schedule once more for her third day here. First class is Law, followed by Spanish, breaks and statistics. She's already scouted out where good study spaces are. Outside when it's warm, the second floor of the main building has great study rooms and areas near the library. 

 

A screeching of the microphone brings the music to a halt and she grimaces as the Dean's voice comes booming through. Rap music plays, which is worse. She gets up to head inside. 

 

"Er, good morning. Many of you are halfway through your first week here at Greendale and as your Dean, I thought I would share a few thoughts of wisdom and inspiration." The week has been going well so far. She's said hello to a few girls from statistics who seem nice, a boy even asked for her number in the canteen. For a moment, she'd assumed it was a joke. No one would ask little Annie Adderall for her number. They'd asked to borrow a pencil, or for her to sit somewhere else. 

 

"What is community college? Well, you've heard all kinds of things. You've heard it's loser-college for remedial teens, twenty-something drop outs, middle-aged divorcees, and old people keeping their minds active as they circle the drain of eternity. That's what you heard, however, I wish you luck!" The Dean finishes in a cheer as everyone else stands still. Feeling bad for him, she heads inside the school.

 

It's actually quite a nice school, with overly bright walls and lockers. It's big, with plenty of poor students to fill in the spaces. This place is not beneath her, but it's definitely beneath health and safely guidelines. She weaves her way through corridors of people to find a good spot. There's an empty chair, tucked behind a bookshelf in a quite area. The norm of hiding away to feel comfortable takes over, and she sits down to read. 

 

+++ 

 

Abed is half listening to the Dean's bad speech when a tall man comes up to him, with blonde hair and the overly confident swagger of a man who is not attending a community college. A teacher perhaps. Carrying nothing, he suspects not. He's an outlier, a faulty piece of data on the system. Like himself, who should be at film school, he is not supposed to be here. Immediately, he likes him. 

 

"You, er, the nerdy Arabic guy, do you know what the time is?" His voice is bored and strained. He's showing frustration in being here, as Abed often would like to. 

 

"I'm only half Arabic actually." He corrects, "My Dad is Palestinian, I mean he's a US citizen and he's not a threat to National security or anything, a lot of people want to know that after they meet him because he has an angry energy but not angry at America, just angry at my Mom for leaving him. Although she did leave because he was angry and he's angry because she's American. My name's Abed by the way." He holds out his hands, as his Dad has taught him when he meets people, to shake. He wonders if he should have started with the name rather than his family. But people don't really care about names, people make friends based on shared experiences and this man looks angry. He can relate to that with his Dad. 

 

"Abed." The man replies, shaking his hand, "Nice to know you then meet you. In that order. Now about that question that I asked?" He's the first person who hasn't cut Abed off when he tries to talk all week. Even the teachers here won't let him talk. He knows at school they had to let him because his Dad made them, but here his Dad hasn't met or spoken to any of the teachers. Being independent is harder than he thought. 

 

"Oh, ah!" He checks his watch, "Five after eleven. When you asked." The man hasn't made any direct eye contact, which is good because Abed's not great at that. He doesn't know when to look away or which eye to look it. It's impossible to look at them both together.

 

"Abed. What's the deal with the hot girl from Spanish class?" Abed remember where he knows the guy from, who he think it's called Jeff. He sits next to him in Spanish, and he's constantly on his phone. "I can't find a road in there." Abed not sure what a road in to her means, but he's spoken to her before. 

 

"Well, I've only spoken to her once while she was borrowing a pencil, but her name is Britta, she's twenty-eight, birthday in October, she has two older brother and one of them works with children who have a disorder I might want to look up. Oh, and she thinks she's going to flunk the tomorrow's test so she really needs to focus and she's sorry if that makes her seem cold." Most people used an excuse around Abed that they're studying and they need to focus, it's usually to make Abed go away because he's seen that they're not focused. He's about to say that, when Jeff cuts in. 

 

"Holy crap. Abed," he actually looks him in the eyes and shakes his hand again, which is weird as they already did that and don't need to do it again, "I see your value now." He turns and walks away, leaving Abed standing there. 

 

"That's the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me." He calls after Jeff, even though he's gone. 

 

He doesn't have a lesson until twelve now, but since he needs to study for the Spanish test, he heads to the library for a textbook. He's humming to himself, trying to recall the Spanish work for book. They haven't learnt much in Spanish class yet, they're teacher doesn't seem to know a lot himself. Every lesson there's five or so new vocabulary words to learn and then a bunch of homework. Having someone to practise with would be great. Sometimes he's not sure in his dorm room if he's talking or thinking. Even when his mouth is moving. 

 

He sees a pretty brunette reading the Spanish book he wants. He can't find it anywhere. "Where did you find that?" He asks, and she jumps slightly, looking up at him. 

 

"This one?" Her voice is quiet, and she's looking down rather than up at him. 

 

"Yes." he wishes he could sound more reassuring that's he's a nice person, and not someone about to yell at her. 

 

She stands up. She's much shorter than him. They walk over to a bookshelf a few feet away and she pushes back a few books to see the textbooks behind them. "Their filing system needs improvement." 

 

"Yeah." He doesn't want to launch into a speech and scare her, "I'm Abed." She's the first to hold out her hand and shake his. Her hands are much softer than Jeff's. She's small, wispy, like a child, yet definitely an adult. Very pretty. 

 

"Hi, I'm Annie." She sits back on the chair and Abed wants to sit down next to her in the other chair. It's a good studying spot. He sits down, holding her breathe that she won't tell him to get lost. She doesn't. He smiles at her. 

 

"How are you feeling for the Spanish test tomorrow?" She asks him, crossing her legs. He looks for tells that she wants him to go, like checking her watch, but she's just looking at him. Her cheeks are flushed slightly. Her eyes are a bright blue. 

 

"Okay." He answers. It shouldn't be too hard. Language isn't too hard for him, he can speak Polish, Arabic and English. He took Spanish for an easy lesson, and because he needs language credit. 

 

"I can't believe we have a test already! I mean, Senior Chang hasn't even taught us any phrases yet." She looks frustrated. 

 

"¿Habla usted español?" Abed says, and when she frowns and he worried he's gotten it wrong. She turns the page of her book. 

 

"Um, Sí." She looks a little uncertain, "Hablo un poquito de español." A little more confident. He nods. She speaks a little bit of Spanish. 

 

"Do you need to focus on studying?" he asks, trying not to bother her. As far as people go, Annie is nice. She hasn't sighed or gotten angry with him for not knowing something, or for talking too quickly or too slowly. She speaks at a quickened pace, almost like she's used to not being listened to. 

 

"This is helpful." She smiles, a smile so bright Abed can't believe he hasn't seen it before. A smile so obviously happy, he doesn't need to think about what emotion it could be. "Do you want to go over anything?" 

 

They've been set to learn a list of forty words, and they'll be a twenty question paper using half of them. Most of them are basic words, like sorry (perdón) and help (Ayúdame). Useful words if you ever go to Spain. A lot of it, Abed covered before at high school. He's got a pretty good memory, so learning words isn't a problem, not even in other languages. It's putting them together that's the problem. He suggests that they say a word in English and the other has to say the Spanish. He gives Annie the easier ones first. 

 

"Wow, Abed! You're really good at Spanish!" She laughs as he knows the phrase get well soon (que te mejores) which is not too hard, as it's just made up of a few words. He wants to thank her for the compliment, but she gasps and gets up before he gets the chance. 

 

"I have a lesson!" She says, and Abed checks the time. He's meant to be in business studies by now. His teacher is not going to be happy. "Thanks for the amazing help!" She picks up her bag and starts rushing away, and he packs away his textbook into his bag. She's left hers and he packs that too, checking when their next Spanish lesson is. 

 

+++++

 

He bumps into Britta later that day after class, the blonde Jeff wants a road with. She's still focusing and he's not going to talk to her, but she stops him. "Abed, how's studying going?" 

 

"Good. Are you still going to flunk the test?" He asks, looking around the corridor for Annie so he can give her back her textbook. 

 

"No! One of the kids in our class, Jeff Winger, is a Spanish tutor. He's invited me to his study group." There's no sign of her anywhere. 

 

"For Spanish?" He asks, thinking maybe Annie will be there. He wants to give her back the textbook, otherwise she might not be able to study. Her notes are slipped into the front cover too. 

 

"Yeah. You should come along! We're meeting in the main study room after classes are over." 

 

He smiles, "Thank you, Britta." It could fix this problem. And give him a chance to study some more for this test. He reckons he can pass, but a high grade would be a good start to showing his Dad he can work hard now. With or without a therapist. 

 

"No problem, Abed." 

 

+++

 

He's running a little late for the study session, after going back to the lockers to drop off most of his heavy textbooks. He picks up a few he'll need for tonight too. His locker is on the other side of campus to the study room. Through the widows, all he can see is Britta and Jeff sat really closely together. They're not kissing, so he walks in.

 

"Abed, in the house!" She cheers and Jeff looks horrified. He cheers back, thinking something is happening. 

 

"Woo. Why?" Jeff says. There are no chairs so he grabs one from the corner. He thought some of the other people he'd recognised from his Spanish class would be here. He invited anyone he saw. Except he still hasn't seen Annie. 

 

"Yeah, Britta invited me. Is that cool?" Since Jeff didn't invited him, it might mean he's not supposed to be here. They're sat in one corner, so he sits down next to them both to fit in. 

 

"Oh, I can't think of a single logical reason why not." Jeff moves a few things out of his way. 

 

"Cool." He's glad he's not intruding. That would be awkward. 

 

Jeff puts a crumpled yellow piece of paper in front of him, "Here. Put your contact info down like that. That's right." Abed's got a pen on his and repeats cool under his breath when he writes down his number. 

 

"Hey, this is kind of like Breakfast club, huh?" he points out, hoping he's not the only one who's seen that movie. 

 

"We are in a library." Britta says and he's pleased. 

 

"Yeah. I'm sure we each have an issue balled up inside of us that would make us cry if we talked about it." Abed doesn't have something he'd cry over. Abed doesn't cry. Can't remember when he last did. Probably as a kid. Maybe when his Mom left.

 

Britta looks weird, her features are stung up tightly and she's frowning, "Do you have an issues that's balled up inside of you?" 

 

"Well, I've got a real doosie in the chamber if things get emotional." He figures he'll be John Bender. He has that speech memorised. His phone goes off and he hopes it's not his Father, asking him if he's changed his mind yet. 

 

"Oh. Text message! Let's give this bad boy a read." It doesn't really sound like John but he can work on it. 

 

Jeff leans against the table, "It's probably just for you." 

 

Abed only has two numbers on his phone. His Dad's and his Mom's. He prefers to write letters to his Mom, which he rarely does any more. She's busy with her life and doesn't have time to reply. His Dad's number is for emergencies. They don't talk unless it's important over the phone. No one texts him. 

 

"I've never gotten one of those before." In his excitment, he forgets about being John for a second, He reads it, and is confused by the message. Jeff is stuttering but he speaks over him, "Say you have to pee. I need to talk to you.... Say you have to pee." He has no idea who would send that to him. A wrong number? He shows his phone to Britta. 

 

"That is weird." He shows it to Jeff too so he doesn't feel left out and tells him again what is says. "Do you have to pee?" Jeff asks. 

 

"No. It's so weird." His voice lowers encase the person who text him his near. Maybe it's a hostage situation like in the movies and they're trying to lure him out and away from his friends. It's possible they could hack into his phone to find out his number. 

 

"Well I'm stumped. It's very creepy." Jeff's own phone starts going off and Abed gets excited. It could be the people who text him! When Jeff says it's not the same message, he's rather disappointed. 

 

"It's just someone with a misguided grasp of abbreviation. I just need five minutes, you guys. I'll be right back. Study all the verbs. In, in Spanish." 

 

Britta is leaning back in her chair, looking like the cool guys in movies. He's trying to figure out which member of the breakfast club she is when she asks him a question, "Abed, what's your read on that guy?" 

 

"You look like Elizabeth Shue." Not a character from the breakfast club, but from back to the future II and other movies he likes. It's a weak reply for her question, but he doesn't want to say something about Jeff. 

 

"Thank you?" Britta opens her Spanish book and stares at the page for a second, "Do you think-" She's cut off by someone walking into the room. A boy who looks particularly proud of something, with his head held high and wide strides. Abed invited him earlier. 

 

"Hey, I'm Troy Barnes." He says, walking forward and drumming twice on the table and taking a seat on the furthest side. "Heard there's a board-certified tutor?" He looks Britta over and smiles at her. 

 

"He just left." Britta fills him in, looking at the door to see if he's coming back. His jacket is here, as well as his keys. He couldn't have left for good. Troy puts his feet up onto the table. Another person walks in, a middle-aged women. She looks lost and a little worried. He remembers her being around when he was talking to Troy. 

 

"I heard this was a, er, Spanish study group?" She tries to smile, "Mind if I join?" 

 

"Sure. The more the better." Abed tells her, and she takes a seat from the corner and drags it round to an empty side of the table. "I'm Abed. This is Britta and Troy. Britta looks like Elizabeth Shue." 

 

"Hello. I'm Shirley." She's holding her handbag on her lap, looking a little out of place. Abed thinks maybe there are a lot of people who aren't supposed to be at Greendale. There's a pale band around her head, holding back a mess of curly black hair. Her necklace is pretty and she has a nice smile. She reminds Abed of the Moms who used to ask Abed if he was okay as a kid. The ones who noticed the quiet kid walking around the shops alone. 

 

An old man walks through the door, and Shirley's mood changes. He's not sure how. Her shoulders hunch forward and lines become visible on her forehead. "Hi! Peirce Hawthrone. This the Spanish study group?" 

 

"The tutor stepped outside. I'm Elizabeth Shue. Take a seat." Britta explains, in a snappy monotone. He's still taking a seat when Annie walks in. Abed smile and stands up, about to say hello when he opens her mouth. 

 

"What is this?" She asks. Unlike this afternoon, she's not soft and blurred. She's sharp and angry. 

 

Britta groans, "A Spanish study group." 

 

She looks shocked for a second, "I wasn't told about it." Abed wants to say something to her, that he tried to invite her. She doesn't let him. "You didn't tell me." 

 

"Annie, right? You should stay. It wasn't an invite thing, just an accidental game of Chinese whispers.

"That's racist." Troy calls out, putting his feet down from the table so he can sit up properly and get a good look at everyone here. 

 

Britta gestures to the only chair left in the corner, which Annie takes and sits next to Shirley, as far away from Abed as possible. She might not have meant to. He picks her textbook out of his bag and slides it towards her. 

 

"I couldn't find you." he hopes she understands. She seems to smile and then takes the textbook, whispering a thanks. They all sit in silence. Abed looks around the room. Everyone here has a deep secret like in breakfast club. 

 

Shirley, the undercover detective who accidentally fired her gun at an unarmed man one dark night and hasn't been able to sleep since. Troy, the popular jock who's had a crush on the most beautiful girl around but can't ever be with her. Piece has a long lost son he can't track down. Annie's parents used to fight until one day, her Dad left and now her Mom won't talk any more. Britta's sister died in a car accident last year; it should have been her. There's an infinite possibilities of plot and backstories now they've come together.

 

It opens up a new infinite of possibilities for the future. 

 

He notices next to him, Britta has left. Abed wants to ask where she's gone, whether he should go too but everyone looks busy or unhappy. Shirley and Annie are muttering to each other, Troy is humming and Pierce is on his laptop. 

 

"You guys are not going to believe this," Jeff is coming through the door into the study room, "but the group...is here." he stops still in his tracks, as everyone turns their attention to him. 

 

Pierce is the first to ask, "Are you the board certified tutor?" 

 

Before Jeff can answer, Troy is talking, "That means you'll do my homework, right Seacrest?" Abed hadn't seen it. but Jeff does look a little like Ryan Seacrest. 

 

"I need to call my babysitter if we're gonna be any later than ten." Shirley says seriously.

 

Annie folds her arms, "What kind of board certifies a tutor?" 

 

"Where's Britta?" Jeff asks Abed, which doesn't answer any of their questions. 

 

"Not sure," he should know,"But I invited more people from Spanish class, is that cool?" For a moment, Abed's worried he might have done something wrong again. After all, a study group should be a group, and you can't have a breakfast club with only John, Molly and Brian. Luckily Jeff says it's fine. 

 

"I'm going to go to the bathroom. And bring my jacket, wallet and keys with me, encase there's a fire." He gathers his things and walks out the door. Abed doesn't think he's coming back. 

 

"He's not coming back, is he?" Shirley's got the same face as when Pierce came in. It must be annoyance, or unhappiness. A negative expression. The rest of them seem quite defeated. 

 

"We could study together?" Annie suggests, "Abed's good at Spanish." He feels himself smiling at the compliment, the same one. Today two people have said nice things about him, and he's made six new friends. If he fails that test tomorrow, it won't be the worst thing to happen. 

 

Abed gets out his pen and paper, ready to start doing some work. Everyone seems okay with the new suggestion and start to lay their books out in front of them. They discuss what they want to study, the hardest phrases that might be helpful to go over. They're about to start when Britta walks back in, closely followed by Jeff. 

 

"Alright, look at this crew. All ready to study all night." He leans again the table, making a movie typical alpha-male speak to unite everyone together. People start to fuss over the all night part and he cuts them off. 

 

"But who studies with strangers, right? My name is Jeff." 

 

Abed wants to tell him they've already done the introductions. "Hello, Jeff. It's a pleasure. My name is Pierce Hawthorne and, yes, that is Hawthorne as in Hawthorne wipes; the award winner moist towel." 

 

"I was just going to ask." Abed's never heard of them, he doesn't really like wipes. They smell too sweet and leave his hands sticky. 

 

"I'm also a toast masters, so perhaps I should do the introductions? You already know Brittles." 

 

"Britta." 

 

"Abed. Abed the Arab." He laughs, and Abed refuses to say anything about it, "Is that inappropriate?" 

 

He cuts off Abed's 'sure' by patting Troy on the shoulder and announcing, "Roy. Roy the wonderboy." 

 

"Troy." 

 

"Little princess Elizabeth." 

 

"Annie." 

 

"And finally this beautiful creature here is named Shirley." 

 

Shirley nods uncomfortably, and Britta is resting her head against her knuckles, seemingly bored. 

 

"I'd like to know why I had to find out about this group on accident." Annie says brightly, twirling a pencil between her thumb. 

 

"This is getting way more like the breakfast club now." 

 

"There's breakfast?" Peirce asks, looking around. 

 

Annie and Shirley start arguing about age and life choices and other things Abed doesn't really keep up with. Abed watches them all. Pierce is making Shirley annoyed and Abed jumps when Troy hits his hands against the table in front of them. 

 

Troy and Annie both start talking about high school, their plots are fairly entwined already. 

 

"You're that girl who got hooked on pills and then dropped out. You're little Annie Adderoll!" He's laughing, and obviously upsetting Annie. He doesn't stop and she starts yelling. She's getting more and more upset and the entire ground starts yelling at each other, raising their voice to be heard. Abed can't stand the voice, it's too much, he slams his hand against his textbook to get their attention. 

 

"You know what I got for Christmas?" Everyone stares at him. He's used to that. "It was a bad year at the Bender family. I got a cartoon of cigarettes. The old man grabbed me and said, 'Hey, smoke up, Johnny.' No Dad! What about you!" Once he's finished, everyone is quiet and he hopes it's fixed. But everyone is still unhappy. Just quieter. 

 

"Nobody puts baby in a corner." He finishes with Dirty dancing as Jeff's phone starts to ring. He leaves, telling them to hash things out. Abed hates metaphors. Britta turns to him and touches his hair, but he's watching Annie get  talked down to by Troy, who's being harsh. He's repeating movie lines in his head, mostly from the breakfast club, to block out the fighting. He badly wants to leave. They're still in chaos when Britta walks out. Annie gets up and starts yelling about not being invited, and Abed stands up and tries to let her know that that wasn't on purpose. 

 

"I looked for you." He tells her and she pauses, turning away and ignoring him. Damn. Jeff walks in and tells them all to sit down, which they listen to because he's the established leader of their club. Be it breakfast or Spanish. 

 

"You know what separates humans from other animals? We're the only species on earth that observes shark week. Sharks don't even observe shark week but we do. For the same reason I can pick up this pencil, tell you it's name is Steve and go like this." He snaps the pencil in half, "And part of you dies, just a little bit, on the inside. Because people can connect with anything. We can sympathize with a pencil, we can forgive a shark and we can give Ben Affleck an academy award for screen writing. People can find the good in just about anything but themselves." Abed can see everyone is listening carefully. 

 

"Look at me. It's clear to every one of you that I am awesome but I can never admit that because that would make me an ass. But what I can do is see what makes Annie awesome. She's driven. We need driven people or the lights go out and the ice cream melts. And Pierce. We need guys like Pierce. This guy has wisdom to offer. We should listen to him some time, we don't regret it. And Shirley, Shirley has earned our respect. Not as a wife, not as a Mother, but as a women. And don't test her on that because that thing about the jukebox was way too specific to be improvised.  And Troy, who cares if Troy thinks he's all that. Maybe he is.  _A_ nd Abed, Abed's a shaman. You ask him to pass the salt and he gives you a bowl of soup, because you know what? Soup is better, Abed is better, you are all better than you think you are, you are just designed not to believe it when you hear it from yourself." 

 

Abed doesn't think soup is better than salt but doesn't say anything, " I want you to look at the person to your left... Sorry look at the person sitting next to you. I want you to extend to that person the same compassion that you extend for sharks, pencils, and Ben Affleck. I want you to say to that person- I forgive you." 

 

Abed tells Britta he forgives her, even though he's only known her for a few days and spoken to her more than once today. She's just a person who doesn't truly want to be here. 

 

"You've just stopped being a study group. You've now become something unstoppable. I hereby pronounce you a community." 

 

Abed tries to imagine the uplifting music that would be playing around now, as Jeff finishes his speech and everyone claps. 

 

"This isn't like the breakfast club anymore." he decides, "now it's like stripes or meatballs or anything with Billy Murray really." 

 

There's some Britta and Jeff talking in which Britta tells Jeff to stop wasting all their time. He liked Jeff, and now it doesn't seem like he should. He dramatically opens his book when Britta suggest studying. 

 

Jeff raising his voice and being the one yelling. 

 

"I thought you were more like Bill Murray in any of his films but now you're more like Michael Douglas in any of his films." he thinks out loud. 

 

"Yeah, well you have Aspergers." 

 

Abed's confused and turns to the group, "What does that mean?" he says, mostly to himself. 

 

He doesn't care what Jeff says. Whether it's a serious illness or not, he's not sick. There's nothing wrong with him. That's why he won't see a therapist. 

 

Finally, Annie starts speaking Spanish and they all settle into a quiet study. It's less exciting as it was with Annie, there's no direct talking between them. She seems determined not to ask him anything in Spanish. Within an hour, Britta suggests they call it a night. They head out together, and see Jeff sitting on the front stair. 

 

He's upset he doesn't have the test answers, and Abed sits on a step a few rows in front of him. He turns to see Annie, along with all the others, are talking to Britta. Their hands are moving and their lips forming words, but he can't hear them. 

 

"What's going on? Can you guys hear me? Am I deaf? Can you hear me talking right now?" When they say yes, he relaxes. "That's good." 

 

"You know what, Jeff, actually we didn't get that far without you so if you wanna come back upstairs." Abed waits until they've all started to move to follow them to talk to Jeff. 

 

"I'm sorry I called you Michael Douglas and I see your value now." He rushes off in search of Annie and stops her before she walks into the room. 

 

"Annie, may I talk to you?" He says, and Shirley leaves Annie after a quick nod of assurance. "I want to say I'm sorry you had to find about the study group on accident. I only came to give you your textbook. I thought you might be here." 

 

She puts her hand on his arm and squeezes, looking him right in the eyes. Usually, that would make him uncomfortable but with Annie, it's not too bad. He's not worried about which eyes to look in, or what she's trying to say. She's clear. "Thank you, Abed." She steps forward and gives him a quick hug, her hair falling behind her back as she walks back into the classroom. Abed watches the people, sat in the same seats around the table, and feelings for the very first time, connected to the college. 

 

After all,there are an infinite of possibilities for the future. 


	2. Spanish 101

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie starts a protest with Shirley. Abed helps her feel okay about her home life.

This morning could not get any worse. She accidentally feel asleep on the sofa after working on her pronunciation for Spanish class and didn't hear her three alarm clocks go off in the morning. She woke up late and didn't have time to go over her notes for class or eat breakfast as usual.Instead, she got dressed and brushed her hair. She's always taken aback by her new self in the mirror. 

 

It took months of dieting and exercise to slim down. The pills probably helped with that. She switched to using silk pillow cases, and using special shampoo to straighten her frizzy hair. It still curls in the morning; nothing she can't straighten with a good pair of straighteners. The wardrobe change had been her Mother's contribution. Indirectly, of course. Her Mom used to buy her dressed and cute outfits as a 'reward' if she lost any weight. None of them actually fit her. Now they do, and she likes them. Of all the things she regrets most about her pill addiction, it's losing her Mom. She wasn't nice, or funny, or supportive towards anything Annie did but at least she was there and that was enough. 

 

It's strange. Now she's the perfect daughter. Smart, cute, no longer the part metal mess of braces and glasses she was, and her Mom won't even look at her. 

 

It's her brother who answers the phone when she rings. He never could stand to let it go to voicemail. Mom send all Annie's things to her apartment that she deemed appropriate, keeping all the pictures of the family. She hasn't go an invitation to her Dad's retirement party, even though it's next week. 

 

She walks to Greendale, and spots Abed walking around the campus outside. She waves, grateful to see someone who can distract her. Abed is so nice to her all of the time. He doesn't ask for homework help or to copy her notes in class. It's weird to think she has friends now. Real friends who care about her and will talk to her in public. 

 

"Hey!" she says, "How's it going?" 

 

Abed doesn't answer for a second, and she knows that using non-literally terms confuses Abed. "How are you?" She corrects. 

 

"I'm good. How are you?" They fall into a wall together, on their way to the study room for their early morning cramming session. It was Annie's idea. Shirley doesn't like to work late, but meeting in the morning is easier as her kids are in school. Shirley tends to come in by nine. Troy complains about the early mornings, but Abed offered him a bed if he'd rather stay over. That way he doesn't have to get up so early. 

 

"Hungry! I slept in and didn't have time for breakfast. No Troy this morning?" It would be nice to see him when they're not in class or with the group. The campus is quieter than normal. People don't come in unless they have a class or want to use the library. 

 

Abed looks like he has an idea, rummages through his bag and pulls out a chocolate bar. "Here." 

 

It's not exactly the breakfast Annie had in mind, "Thanks." She's just grateful to have something to eat that isn't microwavable. Her apartment has an oven, but the ignition doesn't work and she's burnt her hands too many times. Her fridge tends to switch off randomly, so she can't have or afford fresh food. She snaps the bar in half and hands it to Abed. It's a little melted but good. 

 

"He stayed over at his house. His Dad's going to give him a lift." Abed explains, as they turn the corner for the library. "Jeff text me to ask when study group starts." 

 

"Maybe he'll be on time for once." She jokes, "I don't have your number." She's got everyone's but Troy and Abed's. So far, she hasn't spoken to them much. Aside from when she met Abed. He hangs around with Troy and Annie isn't sure how to talk to Troy yet. She can hardly believe he's here, at Greendale in her study group. She knew he planned to come here. Abed pulls his cell out his front pocket and types in the pass code, 1-9-6-3. 

 

"Here." he hands her the phone and she makes a note of his number on the inside of her Spanish textbook. 

 

"Great. Do you have Troy's number?" Texting might be easier. She won't get flustered or make a fool of herself. 

 

"Yep." he scrolls down and she makes a note of that one too, writing Troy's name. The O is replaced with a heart. "Cool." 

 

They break apart in the study room as everyone greets them. She hangs her rosy cardigan over the back of her chair and sits down, smiling at Abed as he sits down as well. She feels much better now. Sometimes a reminder she has good friends is all she needs. 

 

The group are discussing classes, when the Dean's voice becomes booming through for daily announcements. Abed talks about how it makes it seem like TV, which is an interesting thought really because if this was TV, her and Troy would get together. The nerdy girl always transforms, takes off her class and gets the popular boy. 

 

"I guess Jeff's running late again, huh?" She talks so her mouth won't smile and she can look at him. 

 

"Oh, what a shame." Britta says sarcastically, "Maybe we should get started without him." 

 

"No, no, no, no, no. I think we should wait for Jeff." Shirley tells Britta, pointing to Jeff's empty chair. Annie agrees. If they start without him, they'll be being bad friends. He might not understand what time he was meant to be here at this time. Britta looks frustrated. 

 

"But maybe when Jeff gets here we could talk to him, as a group, about his tardiness." She suggests to keep everyone happy. 

 

"Oh, come on now. Don't use that word around Abed." Whatever word Peirce is talking about, he's missed the definition by a long way. Troy makes a joke and Annie giggles louder than anyone. 

 

"Will you guys have some self respect? You guys are obsessing over someone who doesn't give you a second thought. Meanwhile in Guatamala, journalists are being killed by their own government." 

 

Annie is shocked, she watches the news every night and hasn't heard about Guatamala. She stopped reading the local papers after she kept reading about stabbings happening around her streets... and on her street. The women across the hall from her once came over to borrow some sugar, turned out to be a deal pusher. She brought three extra locks for her door and sleeps with a gun her Father gave her by her bed. 

 

"Journalists are being murdered?" She asks, twirling her pink pen in her fingers for better grip. 

 

"Believe me.Every day in that country, people are being killed for speaking out and the worst part of it is, when this is all over-" 

 

"Spoilers." Abed announces, cutting Britta off. 

 

"It's going to be as though it never happened. Hey, Abed, real stories don't have spoilers. You understand that TV and reality are different, right?" 

 

Annie's horrified that people are being killed, journalists as well. She helps Greendale's paper and all they publish is the truth. Imagining a country where people can't say the truth is awful. 

 

"Hey!" Jeff walks in and everyone cheers up, calling hey back. 

 

"M'lady." He kisses Annie's hand and she blushes. Jeff is good guy, just a little self-centred sometimes. 

 

"M'lord." She says as he continues round the table to greet everyone except Britta. She's cold to him, which is understandable since he was a jerk to her when she said no to their date. Britta doesn't seem like the kind of girl who likes liars. She gets mad at him for not turning up on time, even though he has a great excuse. 

 

He hints he wants to have her notes, which she already printed out for him. It's a little extra work for her, but Jeff appreciate it and it feels good to be needed. Plus Greendale doesn't exactly push her limits as far as intelligence goes. It's nice to have more work to do that someone actually looks at, rather than making notes for herself. 

 

"So what's a guy got to do to get a C around here?" Jeff joshes, and the tension from Britta's argument fades away. 

 

Their study session goes well, Abed carries them through pronunciation while Annie remembers the phrases. Shirley has been teaching Spanish to her boys and has printed off lots of kid's colouring books from various Spanish websites. Troy seems to like them. Britta is fairly quiet. 

 

Shirley and Annie walk off to their next class together, waving goodbye to the group when the next lot of announcements ends. They're both concerned about the journalism story, and when Britta walks outside they ask her to tell them more. 

 

"Yeah. We need your help." Annie admits. Caring for her as always been a proximity thing. She cares about her family and friends and the homeless people she sees down the street. She gives to charity and volunteers at various places close to her. Thinking worldwide is new to her. 

 

Shirley suggests they hold a protest, which Annie would love to do. It's a great way to spread awareness at this college. Fliers and posters don't work, people either graffiti them or use them as paper to take notes on when they forget their stuff. She's seen plenty of protests on the news, it'll be a nice way to spend time with Shirley too. Now her Mom isn't talking to her, Shirley becomes the person she goes to for advice and help. 

 

+++ 

 

In Spanish class the next day, Chang is complaining about people and getting himself all worked up. He needs to calm down. Abed can see him intimidating Annie at the front, a few seats in front of him. It was a mistake taking the front seat in Chang's class. Abed tries to sit in the middle of all his class, it's a nice way to blend in. Unless Chang is talking in Spanish, Abed doesn't pay attention to him. 

 

When he announces a group project, Abed checks his card. Casa. House. Britta's matches his. He's happy to work with Britta. She continuously tries to ask him about the things he does, or his TV obsession. The same questions his Dad asks him. 

 

"Do you want to trade cards?" Jeff asks him. He might not know a lot about the group, but Britta does not like Jeff. She won't want to work with him. If they switch, he could end up working with someone who stares at him, or touches him too much and makes too much eye contact. 

 

"No." He grips his card tightly. 

 

"I'll give you twenty bucks." It's temping, Abed could go and see a movie with that money, he hasn't been able to afford that for a  while now his Dad doesn't pay for his films. 

 

"No." he repeats. 

 

"Fifty bucks." 

 

"No. I don't want your money, I want your shirt." It's a nice shirt, one that everyone seems to like. People don't compliment his shirts. "I've had my eye on it since registration day." This is a better deal, no matter who he gets puts with. 

 

"Alright, give me your card." Jeff holds out his hand. 

 

"I don't think you understand. I want to wear it out of here." Jeff stares at him and doesn't blink. After a moment, Jeff shrugs off his shirt and hands it to Abed. Abed doesn't like stripping in public, but no one is watching him so he does. His own t-shirt is way too small for Jeff and Jeff shirt feels smoother against his skin. Better detergent. 

 

Happy, he leaves for his next shirt. Shirley and Annie are outside, deep in conversation. Annie does a double take when she seems him. "Is that Jeff's shirt?" 

 

"Yes." He stops to talk. He's not in a rush to get to his next class. 

 

"It looks nice on you." Annie smiles, "Oh, Abed! You should come to our protest tomorrow. It's helping a good cause!" 

 

"I'm making brownies!" Shirley squeals. 

 

"Sure." Abed rolls up the sleeves of Jeff's shift so they're not covering his wrists. 

 

"Great!" 

 

Abed glad he's wanted there. 

 

+++ 

 

The protest is in full swing. People are holding signs, waving banners and having a good time. Then Britta storms through it, looking like there's a stick up her ass. The banner took hours to make last night, she's proud of it. 

 

She turns off their music, "This is not how you do this!" 

 

"Well, we know it's not how you do this," Shirley argues, "because we're the ones doing it." 

 

"Yeah but this is tacky and lame." She yells, and then apologises, "I didn't mean that. I'm sorry." 

 

How is helping people lame? They're raising awareness and that's what matters. Just because they're not being rude and cold to people, it's tacky? 

 

"Are you saying that we're not allowed to protest?" There are tears in her eyes, all she wants to do is help, "Britta, you sound like Guatamala." 

 

"Sounds like someone has a case of- 'likes to use fresh politics to make themselves feel special but doesn't actually want to do anything-itsis". 

 

"No! I do things! I went to-" Annie's angry but Britta is getting upset, that wasn't what she wants, "I don't do anything. What can I do?" 

 

Annie hates crying. It seems like all she's done for the past few months. Cry about her scholarships, her parents, her crappy apartment. Comparing her life to Guatamala made it seem stupid. What does she have to cry about? And yet here she is, tears falling down her cheeks because her friend called her lame for trying. She can try and try but someone always finds a problem with her. She's not perfect. She wants to be. 

 

When Britta is hanging the silly piñata, Annie makes an excuse and rushes up the the study room. No one notices she's crying. She walks into the room, and falls onto the sofa in the corner, hugging a pillow and telling herself to grow up. It's a protest. One friend. Everyone else liked it. 

 

"Annie?" She jumps and sees Abed, quickly wiping her cheeks and eyes and hoping he won't be able to tell. 

 

She smiles and turns around to him, standing behind the sofa, "Hi, Abed!" She hadn't expected anyone to be here.

 

"You're smiling when you're sad." Abed points out the obvious, "You don't have to do that." He sits down next to her, and doesn't ask what's wrong. To be honest, Annie's not even sure what's wrong exactly. Her life is a mess. Her future used to be special, now it's complicated. 

 

"I'm not sad. I'm," she tries to think of how she feels, "frustrated." More tears fall down her face, hot and heavy. 

 

"Frustrated." Abed studies her face, probably analysing the expression so he knows what it is in the future. He seems to do that a lot. 

 

"I wanted to help." Annie looks at her hands, clamped together on her lap, "I thought it would make me feel better than I can't do things at home." 

 

"Your protest?" They can hear the chanting outside. 

 

"Yeah. I know it's stupid and selfish to care more about me than Guatamala. They're silenced. I want to talk to my Mom. It felt personal." 

 

"You're not selfish." Abed whispers, because she's whispering. 

 

"I am. I do care about those people but not enough. I can never do enough." 

 

Abed thinks, he leans forward to look at her, "My Mom doesn't talk to me." 

 

"Why not?" 

 

"She left my Dad when I was little and wasn't right. Now she has lives far away and doesn't visit. Except for December." Annie puts his hand over his. 

 

"I'm sorry." Parents have so much control over their kids. Even now, as adults, they're still seeking approval. Validation from the people who raised them. Annie's grown up, she should be happy with how her life is. "My Mom stopped taking to me when I went into rehab. Didn't want to blacken the family name." 

 

"I'm sorry." Abed says. She doesn't know if he means it, or is just copying her again. It's nice to hear it. To talk to someone who feels like her. She takes her hand off his to scoop her hair behind her ears. It's sticking to her damp face. 

 

"It's okay. I wish things could be different. For both of us, and Guatamala." She leans against him, feeling drained. She's thrown herself into college, classes, and even the protest to avoid thinking about her Mom. It's exhausting her. He lifts her arms and puts it around her. She's so lucky to have this study group. "Maybe if we protest enough, huh?" 

 

Abed nods and she sighs. 

 

"I should go back. Are you coming?" Annie asks, sitting up. Abed stands up, brushing creases off his jacket. Britta and Shirley manage to make a lot of signs and handing out more brownies. Before Annie runs away, she gives him a hug. "Thanks, Abed." He shrugs, and picks up a marker to make a sign. Quite a crowd has gathered for the silent protest. In an hour, it'll be dark and they can start. Annie's prepared with a hundred candles and ten rolls of duct tape. 

 

More people turn up, bringing with them candles and more signs. Everyone wants to help raise awareness for their cause. With their help, they could put Greendale on the map for caring. Thanks for Shirley, Britta and Annie. It feels great.

 

++++ 

 

Troy finds Abed in the crowd. "Abed, this super hot chick just asked me if we could study sometime!" 

 

"Annie?" Abed guesses, thinking of the heart Annie drew when writing Troy's name. 

 

"What?" Troy brushes off his guess, "Her name's Anita and..." Abed not listening. He's concentrating on his sign. There are black smudges of permanent marker on his fingers. The smell is intoxicating. Annie smelt like brownies and ink. She's working so hard, gathering people to tell them about the crisis of Guatemala and the horrors of what's happening. Troy is talking next to him. 

 

"She's not like a hot hot, more like a cute hot." He waits for Abed to comment. 

 

"Cool." He manages. Talking girls is not his thing. TV girls, actresses are Abed's thing. 

 

"It is cool." Abed finishes coloring in his sign for the protest. It's getting dark and Annie announces it's time to light the candles. Her gaze falls to Abed and he lifts his sign. She gives it a thumbs up approval before starting to light the candles and handing them out, always the optimist and outshining everyone. It's impossible not to believe she cares.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second episode finished. Updates coming soon. I'm trying sticking to the canon world at all times, with added parts, hence the Annie x Troy pining. 
> 
> Not beta-ed so all mistakes are entirely my own.


	3. Introduction to Film

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie makes Abed think about his parents and his childhood, and he makes his first ever film.

It's a beautiful, sunny morning, and Abed's almost sorry to be stuck in class. Especially since Pierce is trying to work out his stupid voice command that isn't working. It's annoying. 

 

Jeff saves the awkwardness by announcing he's found the ultimate blow off class. Although Abed likes his lessons, a lot of them are interesting enough and easy enough to be worth staying awake for, it's nice to be able concentrate on important classes for his Dad's restaurant. 

 

Annie is against the idea until Troy signs up. Since Abed figured out Annie has a crush on Troy, he's been noticing it a lot more. She takes his classes, helps him study, does his homework. She laughs at his bad jokes. The weird thing is that he's never seen someone have a crush so obviously, and Troy hasn't even caught on. Abed doesn't think he could have. He's hard to read. 

 

"I like Robin Williams." Shirley says enthusiastically. 

 

Someone breaks his thoughts, "Abed?" 

 

"Not a fan. In every movie there's an authority figure that gets mad enough to make people laugh." 

 

"No, are you going to take the class?" Jeff prompts. 

 

"Can't. I can only enrol in classes that will help me run the family restaurant. It's been struggling since 2001. Nine eleven was pretty much the nine eleven of the falafel business." 

 

"Your Dad has your whole life planned out for you? Are you even interested in falafel?" Britta looks angry. He hasn't done something wrong. 

 

"I'm interested in making movies." He turns his paper round the pencil that's stuck through it, "But my Dad says all media is Western propaganda that negatively stereotypes Arabs."

 

He thinks they've changed the subject when Britta brings it back to his life. He doesn't mind running the family business, it will make his Dad happy. Sure, making films would be cool, but it's not possible without film classes.  

 

"Abed, how much does a film class cost?" He knows it costs seventy dollars because he looked it up. He thought maybe he could raise the money somehow. She pulls out her purse and writes him a check. He stares at it. The memo says 'for dreams'. It is his dream to become a movie maker. Taking money off a friends seems like something he shouldn't do. On the other hand, Britta is helping him, which is something a friend does. He's not sure there's a right thing to do here. 

 

He slips the cheque into his textbook and thanks Britta for helping him. He wishes he could sound more sincere. 

 

+++ 

 

Jeff's right about the ultimate blow off class. All the professor does is yell a lot and act like somehow telling the truth is equivalent to seizing the day. Shirley's response to why she's hear is not lying, she's there to get a degree. He wants to know why she's there. She's marking down how to seize the day when the Professor Whitman turns his attention to her. 

 

"Ms. Edison here, for example, would rather write about what happens to other people than live what is happening to her." He leans in close to her. He smells bad, like dust. 

 

 "I-I thought there might be a quiz." She stutters. 

 

"Well, here's a quiz for you. Why did the pretty young girl die alone surrounded by sweater-wearing cats who are trained to use human toilets?" Annie can't believe what's she's hearing. This may be Greendale but teachers should not talk that way to their students. 

 

 

"Get up on your desk.Come on. Stand on your desk." He cannot be serious. She'll show him, the jerk. She's not going to die alone, she can seize the day! "Up on your desk." She wobbles slightly, her knees weak as she stands up. 

 

"She made it! ha ha! Everyone stand on your desks! Up, up, up, up, up! come on. Rise, rise, rise above the programming. All your lives you were told don't stand on your desks. Well, why not?" There's a crack and a girl is thrown from her desk with a scream. Annie turns and hops to the ground, helping her to her feet. Her name's Julie. She can stand with some help and they leave the classroom as the Professor announces what their homework is. Swim in a lake? That sounds dangerous. 

 

On her way out of class, she spots Abed holding a video camera. He's taking shots of students walking past, and staring at them through the scream on the recorder. 

 

"Hey, Abed." She calls out, "Film class?" He looks up from the camera and snaps it shut. 

 

"I'm making a documentary about my childhood." 

 

"Great!" she hesitates, "Abed, am I going to die alone surrounded by sweater wearing cats?" Annie tends to cut into a conversation with a backstory. In a movie, they'd be flashbacks. In reality, it's just hard to follow. 

 

"No. You won't die alone. Do you like cats?" He tilts his head, as he does when he's perplexed. 

 

"Not really." She pulls the straps of her bag forward. 

 

"There you go. I'd better keep filming." Abed opens the camera up again and walks away. Annie feels slightly better, but not a lot. I mean, if a professor think she's going to die alone from meeting her once, she's a hopeless case. Troy hasn't spoken to her yet, or flirted with her at all. Here at Greendale, they're friends. She thought if he spent time with her, he'd fall madly in love with her. No such luck. 

 

++++ 

 

Abed's film is coming along nicely. He figured a few days of footage will be enough to make a film. It doesn't have be be very long. He'll script in once his Dad- Jeff- and his Mom - Britta -  have said the lines he wants to use. He's considering asking them to say a few, but it needs to sound genuine and let's face it, they're not born actors.  Britta is his Mother,  desperately trying to help Abed by telling him what to do while telling him he's doing it himself. Jeff is his Dad, determined to force Abed into doing it himself by telling him what to do so he'll turn into him. Bitter and angry. 

 

He knows Britta and Jeff aren't going to get that mad without being nudged towards it. He spends money on coffee in front of Britta, borrows a new camera from tec class and lies that he bought it himself and skips a class with the teacher's permission that's on movie tropes. Those he can pass any test on.

 

"How about pizza?" Annie suggests, when he shares his plan with her, "For the study group? Joe's have this student discount going on! Buy a pizza and get two free? Don't tell them. " Her face is flushed from the excitment of helping. 

 

"Good idea." Abed agrees, and they find the menu and number online. Annie talks on the phone because Annie sounds like a student than a prank caller. They bring it into the study room for their Spanish get together. Britta and Jeff look furious. 

 

Jeff snaps first, "So, Abed, how's film class?" 

 

"Good." 

 

"Did you go to class today?" 

 

Abed did, but he's not going to tell them that, "Not really." Annie gave him a recorder for any class he misses, so he can make notes. She's sneaky and helpful in plotting against his parents. 

 

"Not really? Well, Britta's paying for those classes. Don't you think maybe you should go?" 

 

"I was shooting my movie." 

 

"Yeah but your movie's for class!" Britta interjects. 

 

Abed pans the camera between his fake parents, "My movie's more important." 

 

"Someone ordered seven lattes?" A man walks into the study room. That was Annie's idea too. She used her ladyness to get a discount and he split the bill with her. 

Britta cracks and yells first, storming out of the study room. It's great footage. Abed wants to feel guilty but technically Britta is being a bad friend too. She's treating him like a child, when he's got a hang of his finances. People assume to can't sort things out. He eats cereal and canteen food, which is included in his room price. His room is cheap as he takes full time classes. He's using savings from previous birthdays and guilty money from his Mother. It's weird how he can make people act perfectly without them knowing. How easily people can be manipulated. It doesn't feel good. 

 

Editing the video takes another day, and he texts Annie to gather Jeff and Britta in the study room. As well as his Father, who he invites himself. It's a badly put together production, but he shoots movies, not edits them. When he's famous, someone else does that. As he's putting the final touches on it, he ignores Britta, Jeff and his Father arguing about him. He knows how he acts, what people think he's like. This isn't surprising. 

 

"Finished!" he cuts them off, "Britta, Jeff, Dad." He points to three chairs. His Dad sits down last, not wanting to encourage him. Most of the stuff in the movie is childhood memories. The documentary part is about his parents and his weirdness. He's been thinking about his Mother since he spoke with Annie.  He expects people to criticise the camera angles and bad Photoshop skills. They all look sad. 

 

His Dad's crying. For the first time in a very long time, he looks at Abed properly. He wants to connect with his Father, to feel what he's feeling. When people call him weird, it's like they're telling him something new. But he knows. He knows that people don't think or see how he sees. That there's loose wires in his brain. Faulty hazards. Loose batteries.

 

"I never said I blamed you for her leaving." He's speaking in Arabic, but Abed translates as easily as English.

 

"You never had to say it." He replies. His Mother walked out on his Father because of Abed. She couldn't cope. Most parents can't. He couldn't blame her for that. It's now his job to make his Dad happy. To take over the family restaurant. That's what his Father wants.

 

"My son is hard to understand. If movies help him to be understood, then I'll pay for the class." he gets up and pats Abed's shoulder."But falafel is a fall back!" he reminds him. It's a start. The closest he's gotten to connecting to his Father in a long time. He's got to take the camera back to the department before they charge him late fees. Britta and Jeff are talking and don't notice him go. 

 

He bumps into Annie on his way there. "Annie?" He says and she turns around, smiling at him. "I think you should call your Mom." 

 

"What?" Her face drops. 

 

"You don't need her any more. But it can't hurt to have a fall back. She might have change her mind." 

 

"I don't know..." She nipples on the corner of her lip, a dent in the middle of her eyebrows appearing. 

 

"Do it. The potential rewards outweigh what could happen. Seize the day. For class." He leaves her to think about. If he can get his Father to fill out a cheque for Abed to take film classes, Annie can convince her Mother to give her a second chance. She deserves one. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All mistakes are my own. 
> 
> Next chapter is one of my favourite episodes! Thanks for reading.


	4. Social Psychology

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abed tries to be a good friend to Annie by helping out with her psych experiment. Troy is clueless about how Annie feels.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lot of social psychology is showed around Annie, and since there's little actual Annie/Abed interaction, I went with Abed's POV for most of it. One of the cutest Annie and Abed episode though!

Senior Chang is in a seemingly happy mood this morning. Smiling and telling people they look nice. "Before we wrap up, I would like to thank you guys for filling out these anonymous evaluation cards. I found your feedback to be largely constructive and flattering, So gracias on that." 

 

Annie is not expecting him to have read their evaluations. In fact, she'd only written one line. "Not a good teacher." She didn't feel the need to elaborate on that. Chang isn't a good teacher; he comes to class late, he makes them repeat the same five words in different tones all lesson and then learn an entire chapter for the next class. His work load is all over the place depending on his mood. He follows no set schedule or curriculum.  

 

Chang terrifies Annie. There's a vibe to him, a bad aurorae that unsettles her stomach. His eyes are crazy and cold. When she baked muffins, he crush on in his hand and told her he didn't like gifts. A simple 'no thank you' would have done. He doesn't respond to her friendly greetings around campus, or remember anyone's names. When he presses his forehead against hers that morning, she tastes blood in her mouth and can feel her pulse in her fingers and toes. She doesn't dare breathe. 

 

He kisses her forehead and she swears it's the kiss of death. Her evaluation wasn't racist and she's not a coward. Her knees are shaking when she stands to leave class. She runs to the bathroom and cries for a minute. Literally a minute. Apparently timed cries are good for the lungs, skin and mental health. If she limits herself to one cry a day, all she has to do is save up all her sad feelings until that time and let them burst out of her like a full balloon. 

 

When she's done she washes her face and reapplies her make up so her eyes don't look red. On the mirror is a flyer for a psychology extra credit assignment. She tears it from the wall and reads it. The advanced psychology class is full and she can't get in at the moment, but the extra credit could secure her a place next year. A real psychology theory could get her name out there, and actually make Greendale a better college. 

 

"Professor Duncan." She reads out loud, excited about this new opportunity. 

 

"Oh God." A lady inside a stall says, "If you're having sex, can I wash my hands first?" 

 

"Er," Annie leaves the flyer in the sink and rushes out of there so quickly the door slams behind her. It's lunch period, so the professor might be in the canteen. It's worth a shot. Jeff is at one of the tables. 

 

"Jeff!" she calls, "You know professor Duncan?" 

 

"Unfortunately, Why?" He looks up from his phone. 

 

"Please get him to let me into his experiment as a favour? Or come stand next to me when he walks. Nepotism might help push his decision." She's practically begging, her eyes wide and hopeful. Jeff tends to fall for the damsel in distress thing. 

 

"Not a chance, Annie. You can't get by on your own if I do this for you. I'm helping you." Annie narrows her eyes. His sharp return is nothing but his lawyer self showing he can manipulate her into doing it alone. It's not going to work exactly. She knows he won't help her, but she's sure as hell not going to act like he's helping her out. 

 

"Fine. Don't be a good friend." She storms away and see's Professor Duncan is waiting in line. Now is a great time to ambush him. 

 

"Professor Duncan!" She pushes her way through the students waiting in line, "Annie Edison. I'm in your 101 lecture. I've heard about your special psych lab." 

 

"Ah, yes. The Duncan principle." He looks like a real psychologist with the plaid brown shirt and waistcoat. The British accent makes him sound smarter. 

 

"And I know it's limited to second-Year students, But I had a 4.0 at riverside high, And I'm not looking down on this school at all, but I'm only here because of a brief addiction to pills that I was told would help me focus, but they actually made me lose my scholarship and virginity. 

 

"So. Right." That was a little too much information, Annie has no filter when she's nervous. She carries on like she didn't just tell a teacher about her virginity. 

  
"If you would let me take your lab early, it would be a real feather in my transcript." 

 

"Okay, I've actually been in this situation many times, So I'm just going to be up front. I'm not allowed to date students."

  
"Oh!" She's not sure how she gave the idea she was interested. Guys seems to think she's asking them out and flirting with them, when really she's being nice. 

 

"Even though you're an eight. Which is a British ten, So I'm angry. But if, in spite of that, you are still interested, then you may join the lab." She squeals and jumps up and down. 

 

"Ah! Okay. You need to bring two human subjects and it would not hurt your chances one bit If you could lend me a fiver. I seem to have left my purse in my duffle And my duffle in the boot of my lorry, so..." Annie doesn't know what a duffle is, unless he means the bag. All she has to do now is convince two people to be experimented on. Shouldn't be a problem. 

 

"So who wants to be in a psych experiment?" She asks cheerily as she approaches her friends. Pierce is wearing a mini basket on his head.  It's not the weirdest thing to see on campus. Someone work a snorkel around for a month because they thought there was going to be a tsunami soon. Their dog was acting up. Turned out it was pregnant. 

 

"Hey, guys, guys, guys? Annie is talking about some kind of experiment." 

 

"She's behind you." Jeff tells Pierce and he walks away to do weird things in another place. 

 

"Please? You get paid." She tries to make it sound good.

 

Troy looks interested,"Do they do stuff to your butt?"

 

"No." Annie's not even sure that's legal. 

  
"Do you get paid more if they do stuff to your butt?"

 

 "No." He must be joking. 

 

"That's fine. I'll do it. I'm in." 

 

"Yay!" It's a great way to spend time with Troy. "How about you, Abed? It's tomorrow." 

 

"Ooh, tomorrow? They're showing all four Indiana Joneses at the vista. I'm really looking forward to the first three. I bought a whip." She steps closer to him. 

 

"This is really important to me, Abed." This experiment could really, really help her. "Could you please go as my friend? My really good friend?"

 

"Wow, I didn't realize we were really good friends." She's quite offended about that. She thought Abed and her had grown quite close. They're been texting a lot. Abed keeps suggesting movies for Annie to watch. 

 

"I figured we were more like chandler and phoebe;they never really had stories together. Sure, I'll do it, Chandler." She's just happy he's agreed to do it and she hugs him. He doesn't hug back, but he smiles. She turns to hug Troy, but is too coy to. 

 

"It starts at nine. You'll be told everything when you get there. I'm going to go prepare. Thank you, thank you, thank you!" She leaves, clapping her hands together and heading to the library. 

 

+++

 

Troy meets Abed at his dorm room at eight fifty so they can head to the psych experiment together. 

 

"I hope it's about mind reading. Or they're going to turn us into super soldiers like Captain America or the Hulk." Abed's never really been a fan of marvel comics. Too much action, not enough follow through.

 

"Are you in love with Annie?" Abed asks.

 

"What?" Troy stops Abed by putting his hands out in front of him. "Why do you ask that?" 

 

"Because, you knew each other before and you're friends." Abed lies slightly. He doesn't think he's supposed to tell Troy about the heart Annie drew when she wrote his name, It could just be a coincidence, she might write all her O's like that. 

 

"Come on, dude. We're friends. Did she say something?" 

 

Abed shakes her head. She hasn't said anything to him. "Right." 

 

The room the experiment is taking place in is an ordinary classroom with no special equipment. Just a semi-circle of chairs. They're early and take a seat closest to the door. Most of the students he recognises. Senior Chang is here. He waves. 

 

There's murmured talking, mostly between pairs of people that each experimenter must have brought. Annie told Abed he didn't need to bring anything with him. He was sad to leave him whip behind, since he planned on using it today. After the experiment is over, he might go buy popcorn and make it himself. He'd rather be at the movies. Annie's nice, but Indian Jones is better. As her friend, he's expected to be here. 

 

Annie walks into the room and says hello to Troy and him. She looks excited, with rosy cheeks and a wide smile. "We're running a bit behind and we'll be starting in about five minutes." She's lying, Abed thinks. She blinks more when she lies. It doesn't make any sense. Troy turns to him once Annie has left the room and Chang has had a breakdown.

 

"You really think she's in to me?" He whispers.

 

Abed turns away and doesn't answer.

 

++++

 

Over the next few hours, Troy and him find ways to pass the time. They play thumb wars and i-spy. Abed wins at both. Troy tries flirting with some of the girls, but she leaves after hour two. Three hours in and the everyone else has left and gotten upset about the waste of time.  Troy's been rocking for twenty minutes, he's sweating and pulling at the sleeves of his jacket. Abed goes through the Indiana Jones movies, word for word, in his head. He's half way through the first movie when Troy stands up. 

 

"Annie! Annie! What is going on in there? Why- what is taking so long? I wasted all day- caring for you! The soul train awards were tonight! You promised butt stuff!" Abed watches him crawl and drag himself out the classroom. He can't hear them talking next door. He thinks of things that could have gone wrong. The monkeys they planned on training escaped, the poisons they were going to inject them with have mutated, this was all some kind of joke. 

 

Either way, he's going to wait for Annie. It's what good friends do. This is important to her and he's not going to mess it up. 

 

++++ 

 

He manages to get through the rest of the Indian Jones movies. Then star wars. Then the Muppets. He's really hungry but they bring him out some food. 

 

Annie walks out looking stressed. Whatever's happening in there must be chaotic and stressful. Her pen is tucked into her messy hair and her mascara is smudged. 

 

"Sorry you've been waiting twenty-six hours." She sounds upset, "It's just going to be another five minutes." 

 

"Okie dokie." He really wants to be a good friend, but this is getting really hard. He's running out of movies he knows. Friends episodes are next. He likes those. From the next room, he hears screaming. Something bad must be happening. He almost gets up to see if things are okay when Annie storms into the room. 

 

"GO HOME." She slams the door behind her. This has been a waste of a day. He should have never made any friends at Greendale, or agreed to do this. Being a good person is far too hard from him. He'd rather be selfish. 

 

"Cool." The screaming must have been nothing. "See ya!" he calls in to Annie. He won't be late for his classes now, and he managed to do it. He runs back to the dorms to brush his teeth and wash. He's tired but his Dad will be super mad if he cuts class. After his film studies, he finds Troy to go over some Spanish. He's recovered from yesterday. 

 

Annie walks in to the study room, "Hey. Sorry for bailing on the psych experiment." 

 

"That was the experiment, Troy. We were testing to see how long people would wait in the room." She shrugs her back off her shoulders and sits down. She's changed and fixed her hair, but her attitude hasn't changed. 

 

"Woah." 

 

"Oh, got ya." Abed untangles his headphones. 

 

"Got ya? That's all you have to say?" 

 

"Yeah." 

 

"You sat in a room for twenty-six straight hours. Didn't that bother you?" 

 

"Yeah, I was livid." Couldn't she tell? 

 

"Why didn't you leave?!" 

 

It's obvious. "Because you asked me to stay and you said we were friends." 

 

She sits down, defeated. Abed didn't mean to say the wrong thing. 

 

He watches Annie as the group make fun of Britta's boyfriend. Making fun of people has never been something he's liked doing. 

 

All day he feels a mixture of guilty, for ruining Annie's experiment and making her upset and mad that she tricked and yelled at him when he'd only done what she'd asked. He can't seem to get the hang of being someone's friend. When he tries, he gets it wrong. 

 

The canteen is serving up jello and he manages to get a pot of his favourite flavour; green. No one is around so he sits by himself. He's concentrating on the jello when Annie approaches him. 

 

"Here. I wanted to say sorry for yelling at you." She puts a green and yellow bag on the table. His two favourite colors. She's curled ribbon around the handles as well. He looks inside. 

 

"Indian Jones. Cool." She remembered. He no longer feels mad. 

 

"I just got the first three because the forth one blows." he finishes the sentence with her. 

 

"We're cool." She looks pleased and sits down across from him. She takes his hand across the table. 

 

"Thanks for being such a good friend, Abed." 

 

She leaves to get food, and Abed takes out the DVD's. They're the good kind, the ones he can't afford now. Annie probably can't afford them either. He's going to invite her to watch them with him tonight. Troy walks into the canteen and sees his present. 

 

"Those from Annie?" He sits down where she sat. 

 

"Yep." He realises how he could be a better friend to Annie. Telling Troy to ask her out. It would make her happy. "Troy, Annie..." He stops himself when Troy stares at him blankly. How can she be in love with someone who doesn't know her enough to see she loves them? Troy's not stupid or blind, he should be able to see. He could see, if he'd look at her. 

 

"Annie?" Troy repeats, rolling his hand to let Abed continue. 

 

"Never mind." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know three chapter in twenty four hours is a lot but I go back to college next week and I'd like to get as much written as possible. Thanks for reading. Update coming soon.


	5. Advanced Criminal Law

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie helps Abed hatch a plan against Troy. They make excellent partners in crime.

"Morning, Abed!" Annie smiles as she spots him walking into the study room. There's no way in there yet. It's too early for Jeff and Troy, Shirley is on the kid's morning run, she has no idea what Pierce does in the mornings. Britta has a volunteer programme from eight to nine. Annie went on a run this morning, listening to the audio of the book 'CBT for dummies'. After the Abed experiment, she's not sure about pursuing psychology but she's kept going with the 101 class. 

 

She feels like crap about treating Abed the way she did. The worse part was how nice he was being about it. He invited her to watch the good three Indiana Jones with him that evening. She went along, and they had a good time. Abed makes really good buttered noodles. His dorm room is cosy, with a pile of blankets. A few are weighted and feel better to be lie underneath when it started to get late. She dozed off towards the end of the second. Abed didn't wake her up. She's hoping he didn't notice. 

 

Part of her hoped Troy would be there. Her disappointment was quickly forgotten in a world of spiders, snakes and hats. Abed adds his own commentary throughout a lot of them. Like watching a documentary about the movie at the same time as watching the actual movie. 

 

"Hi, Annie." Abed says as she sits across the table from him, "You're early." 

 

"Early morning run." She gestures to the work he's got in front of him, "Why are you here?" 

 

"Our Spanish essay." He holds up the sheet of paper. His handwriting is messy and she squints to be able to see it. 

 

"That's not due for another week." Annie's is already done on her table. The group sessions can get a little out of hand and if she relies on them all for sorting out the essay, she'd lose her point grade average. "What inanimate object did you choose?" 

 

They're essay is to write a two page account of their day from the perspective of an object. "A pen." He shrugs, "It's lame." 

 

"No, it's clever! I choose a backpack. I thought I could use college vocabulary from last week." The whole assignment isn't the coolest idea Chang has ever come up with. 

 

"Shirley will be an oven." Abed guesses, pointing to Shirley's empty chair. 

 

"Jeff will be a car. Oh, and Britta will be a microphone." The group are rather predictable. Jeff will choose something easy (they studies directions last month). Britta will try and be clever and write about helping to free speech and being important, and her essay will be filled with mistakes. 

 

Abed smiles, "Troy'll be a football. And Pierce will be his wet wipes." They both laugh at the idea of their friends being objects. She wouldn't have been able to guess what Abed would have chosen. He's the most unpredictable. 

 

++++ 

 

Abed stares at Troy as he talks about do you think Luis Guzman on the way to Spanish. He's barley listening when Troy starts telling him that he's called Luis Guzman. He's thinking about Annie. She seems different lately, around Abed. More smiley. 

 

"I'm president Obama's nephew." Troy whispers. She feel asleep on his shoulder on movie night, at one of the best points of the scene. He went to wake her up but didn't want to. People get grumpy when they're woken up. 

  
"You never mentioned that." He whispers back. It's not surprising that Obama has many siblings. One of them may have been Troy's Mom or Dad. He's never met them. 

 

"I didn't know if i could trust you." He looks serious. His eyebrows are frozen on his face, and his mouth is turned down at the sides. His eyes are widened, looking intensely at Abed. "But now it's time to tell you everything." 

 

He's told a string of weird things about the invention of cars, and then Chang walks in. Someone cheated on the test. Hardly surprising, considering the Spanish class have been struggling with the curriculum all year, it was only a matter of time for someone to cheat on one of the frequent tests that covers everything not taught in class. 

 

When class is dismissed, the group all gather in the study room to gossip about it. "The only difference between señor Chang and Stalin is that I know who señor Chang is." Troy gets the ball rolling. It's not exactly on topic for them. Annie looks nervous. It wouldn't have been her who cheated. Or Shirley. They both get top grades by working hard. 

 

"Did you hear him call me Jackie like I'm some black female caricature? If the good lord hadn't been watching, I'd have slapped him upside the head." Shirley adds. 

 

"Who do you guys think cheated?" Pierce asks and simultaneously the group turn to look at Jeff. He's easily moral-less enough to cheat.

 

"Flattering. But if I'm gonna cheat, I'm not gonna write information from a book onto a piece of paper. That's practically learning, for god's sakes. Whoever made that crib sheet wasn't a real cheater. Just insecure and naive." He makes a good point. Abed doesn't think they should trust his word for it. He lies for a living. 

 

 Eyes turn to Annie. He follows their gaze, disbelieving Annie would cheat. She freaks out taking a different route to classes because she thinks it's bad karma. "I may be naive, but I'm not stupid."

  
She glares at Troy, "Well, I may be stupid, But I'm not trying to look like I'm not." Troy scrapes a passing grade every test. That cheat sheet had every piece of information on it. Not even Troy is stupid enough to get an A by cheating and assume no one will question it. 

 

"Well, I may be a genius, but I'm not a lesbian." It was probably Pierce. Although he has nothing to gain from cheating. He's been at the college for years, failing a class won't hold back his dreams. Having caffeine after 6pm holds back his dreams. 

 

"Who cares who made the crib sheet? The only real cheater is the guy who's threatening everyone with a zero." Britta, Shirley and Abed are the only ones not to have been accused of cheating. Of them, it's likely to have been Britta. She's not stupid. Just not great at Spanish either. 

 

"You're right! it's so unfair." Annie agrees, "And i can't handle this kind of stress right now. I'm already overwhelmed by my duties on the school song committee." 

 

Abed carries on watching Britta, She's been chewing her pencil and rubbing her thumbs over his fingers nervously on her lap. All the signs of a guilty person. Every movie has taught him that. He stops looking. He doesn't want to know if Britta cheated. 

 

"Troy could do the school song. Troy invented rap music, And he's related to Danny Glover and President Obama." Abed offers. It would give Annie and Troy a chance to spend time together. He watched a few rom-coms, girl stuff, to see what he should do about their situation. Movies suggested that as the make best friend, he should help get them together, before kissing the girl himself. He'll cut it short before that part. 

 

"Abed, have you been racist this whole time while I'm telling everybody at church what a sweet little caramel angel you are?" Abed's not sure what a caramel angel is, it sounds like a cookie. Or why what he said is racist. 

 

"Hey, man, that stuff I said this morning wasn't true. I was just messin' with you." 

 

That doesn't make any sense. "You were lying?"

 

"Yeah, as a joke. You've never had anybody mess with you before?" Abed tries to figure out what exactly he means. Lying as a joke. Like what Jeff does, but funny. 

 

"Yes. Just kidding. No. Like that? This isn't a table." He rests his fingers on the obvious table.  "Ha ha! That's funny." He doesn't really get it. 

 

+++ 

 

After Annie's done talking to Pierce about the school jingle, she grabs lunch for the cafeteria. It's cheaper than bringing food at home, largely due to the frozen nature of the meat and vegetables. Abed's sat at the table with Troy. She joins them. 

 

"My favourite movie is Avatar." He's telling Troy, "I'm actually a ninja. I once met Neil Armstrong." He's reeling off lies to Troy, who rolls his eyes. 

 

"I'm going to talk to Pierce." He raises his eyebrows at Annie, picks up his tray and walks away. 

 

"I haven't got the hang of it yet." Abed sighs and bites into his apple. 

 

Annie toys around with her salad, keeping for anything that moves, "You're trying too hard. It has to be believable." 

 

"Can I tell you something serious?" Annie lays her fork down. 

 

"Yeah?" 

 

"Dogs are better than cats. I think I might be falling in love with you." Abed pauses and Annie is shocked. Her head starts spinning and she's opening her mouth to say something when Abed laughs, "Just messing with you." He looks proud of himself for tricking her, "I think I'm getting better. Which one was more believable?" 

 

Annie is struggling to get any words out. That's the first time - real or not- someone has said that to her.

 

"I want Troy to stop. How am I supposed to know when he's lying to me or telling the truth? Is he name really Troy? Does he even like star wars? Is he a student at this-" Abed continues and Annie tells herself it's stupid to have fallen for that. Especially since they're talking about lying to your friends. 

 

"Woah, Abed." She acts out taking deep breaths. He was talking too quickly to breathe. "If you want him to stop, you need to take the fun away from it. Alienate the game." 

 

Abed takes a deep breath, and puts his thumbs up, picking up an apple. "You're a genius." He leave his tray and jacket on the seat and follows closely after Abed. She stares at the empty seats in front of here, and her plate full of food she now has to eat alone. "You're welcome." She says bitterly. 

 

+++ 

 

Abed turns to Britta when Chang gives the cheater one last chance to own up for what they did. She doesn't budge. Annie screams. 

 

" No! I've never gotten a zero before." She adds in a lower voice. Britta stands up.

 

"I did it." She stands up to Chang. "How dare you terrorize a class by threatening their grades. It's not that easy to get human beings to turn on each other." 

 

"Turn on her!" Chang demands. Abed doesn't toss paper at Britta like everyone else. This isn't surprising. He's contemplating how to carry out his plan on Troy so they'll never lie to each other for fun. It's a brilliant plan. One he's proud of. 

 

Abed gets an A on the test. It would have been an A+ if he hadn't misspelled Señor.  Annie swivels in her chair to show Abed her A+ on the front of her paper. He shows her his A and she gives him a little clap and blows him a kiss. Troy gets a C and gets the same clap and kiss. Jeff pulls a C- and Pierce refuses to show anyone, saying he's a musician, not a Spanish lesbian. It's nice to celebrate their grades together. As a group, their grades feel shared. 

 

He finds Troy in the study room after class, "Did you hear? All dogs are blue now. Every single dog in the world is blue. I'm just messing with you." Troy looks predictably unimpressed. 

 

"Yeah, I know, but let me explain to you a few things about how this works." He pulls out a notepad and pencil to take notes, "Uh, first of all, I cannot be got, because I am not gullible like you. Secondly, you are not good at this, Because you are not believable in your face, okay? Your face? it's bad." 

 

"Okay." Abed listened and goes over the already written notes in his notepad, going over them in darker pencil. 

 

"Um, also, you gotta ride the line between believable and...what are you writing in?" He finally notices. 

 

"It's a notepad." He flips the book shut and gets up from the sofa. 

 

"Yeah, but what are- what language?"

 

Abed waves off his question, "It's probably Arabic." He runs out the room making weird noises. Plan successfully executed. 

 

+++ 

 

Abed hides behind the bush and waits until he sees Troy walking towards him sucking on a lollipop and holding some booklets. Abed ducks down to his knees and starts making beeping noices. 

 

"Beginning transmission. The primary purpose seems to be male bonding, and the attitude during conveyance of the random deceit is apparently of great importance. The humanoid is approximately five feet, ten inches in height."

 

"What are you doing?"

 

He raises his voice to sound guilty, " Oh, hey, Troy. I didn't see you. Um, how long were you standing there?" 

 

"You trying to mess with me?" Troy accusingly points his lolly at Abed. 

 

"Yes, that's what I was doing. You got me. I was just messing with you, but I guess I blew it again."

 

"Yeah. You did." Abed turns and runs, hopping onto the bench and onto the grass, making blipping noises. People have called him non-human in the past and while Troy isn't gullible to actual lies, he might believe Abed's s bad at this messing around thing. 

 

As soon as he turned the corner and is hidden by a wall, he pulls out his phone and texts Annie, who's in astrology class next with Troy. 

 

CAN YOU TELL TROY IN ASTROLOGY I'VE BEEN ACTING WEIRD?  

 

Annie's response is fairly immediate: SURE :) PLAN GOING OK? XX

 

HUMAN TROY BELIEVES ROUSE. He types back. Texting is somewhat new to him but he's getting better at it. 

 

AWESOME!! :D PIERCE IS RELEASING THE SONG ON FRI, WILL U COME? XX

 

COOL. YEAH. 

 

C U THEN! XX

 

The final part of his plan is carefully put in place during film class. For a new project, he's supposed to use a green screen which helps a lot to make a fake alien video to annoy Troy. Finally he sets up the classroom with a CVR and Annie is stationed down the hall. She's spying on Pierce writing a song, and texts Abed when Troy walks in so he can play the video at the right time. The hand movements fall in naturally with the talking.  

 

Troy bursts in on him, "Stop! Stop doing this right now." 

 

 "Whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm not an alien." The plan only works if Troy feels bad enough to end the 'messing around' thing. Being gullible sucks and he needs to trust Troy, not doubt every word he says. He's not had friends who do this. 

 

"I never thought you were! But this is insane, okay? Those are credible alien hand movements. You invented a whole language. I'm pretty sure you rented a green screen." Used in class, Abed mentally corrects. 

 

"Yeah." 

 

"It would be less creepy If you were actually an alien." 

  
Abed follows with the punchline. "This is what friends do." 

 

"No. From now on, Abed, friends don't mess with each other." Success! No more lying to each other. 

 

"Cool." Garrett ruins it by running in with a paper eye on his forehead in a green robe. It was a backup plan. Encase Troy didn't take the original bait. He runs down the corridor, Annie turns to shush him as he approaches. 

 

"It worked!" He whispers and Annie gently high fives him so they don't get caught. 

 

"It's a shame. You were improving." She shrugs and they move around the corner, "I almost believed you were in love with me." 

 

"Haha. Fooled you." Abed checks round the corner for Troy and see's he's heading do them, about to blow their cover. "See you." He nods goodbye and goes to find his other friend. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know the messing around declaration of I love you was a little prompt and Abed is not yet in love with Annie (or at least, doesn't realise it. It really is a slow built, sorry) I'm trying not to repeat too much of the episodes dialogue, just enough to remind you what the episode's plot with Annie and Abed is. Hope you like the new chapter, thanks for the support so far!


	6. Football, Feminism and You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie helps Troy study and tries to stop him joining the Greendale Human Being. Abed lays low for everyone except Annie.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Abed laying low in the episode means he's in about three scenes of the actual show so most of this chapter is Annie's POV. I'm sticking to canon with her crush on Troy but there's Annie x Abed in here still :)

Annie doodles stars around her astrology textbook, linking them with dots so they're holding each other in position. When she was a little girl, she's make wishes on stars. That she'd be pretty, popular, or something good. Then she wished for Troy to notice her. In a way, stars made it happen. Through astrology class. 

 

Popular Troy, enrolling in her astrology class, was the biggest surprise when she started at Greendale. She'd come and sat next to her and asked for her help during class. Since they'd joined Greendale, he'd said hello to her in the corridor. Been nice to her. Remembered her name. Being Troy's friend was great, he's a really sweet person who cares about a lot of things. 

 

She'd spent this morning turning her own revision notes into a set of questions to quiz Troy on. She's gone for a red cardigan so she has an excuse to wear red lipstick that makes her look like the girls in high school Troy used to make out with. He'd come to algebra with red stains around his mouth and on his neck. Annie hated those girls. 

 

On the way to class, she bumps into Britta and Abed sat outside main room. Abed's playing on his phone. Britta is smoking. "Hey, Annie. Nice lipstick." 

 

"You have lipstick on your teeth." Abed looks up from his phone to warn her. She blushes and pulls tissues from her bag, scrubbing off the lipstick so roughly it hurts her mouth. Maybe she should stick to lip balm and gloss. Troy wasn't interested in those girls because of their lip colour. She leaves them to discuss the dangers of smoking vs the dangers of binge watching TV shows. Abed will always win with that one. 

 

She sprays rose scented perfume on her wrists and neck so she won't smell like cigarettes. Troy is running late. He text her this morning, so he's awake. She sets up her things and goes through a couple of the cards. She's pre-prepared for the test. She knows everything from the moon to the milky way. 

 

Troy arrives apologising. She waves off his worries. "Hi, Troy." Her hand goes up to her hair and she twirls it a little, smiling at him. "Ready to study?" 

 

"Yes!" he looks proud, "Hit me." 

 

She picks up her first notecard, asks the question about nebulas and he gets it right. He misses a few key points off long essay questions, but can define most of the galaxy's key aspects well. She memorizes the textbook while Troy probably only read it a few times during class. It helps that they're teacher is old and repeats himself a lot. He stands up and paces when he answers her questions, doing celebratory dances when he gets the right answer. 

 

"And what does a star turn into after it collapses?" She asks as Jeff walks into the room. 

 

"A movie of the week." He laughs at his own sarcasm from across the room. 

 

"Black hole." Troy answers triumphantly, ignoring Jeff. The rest of the group start to follow short into the room.  

 

"Right! Troy! You could be an astronomer." She's pleased their study sessions are working. Troy hasn't excelled so much in a subject since Greendale had it's last fair and Troy came first on the 'eat-the-donut-tied-to-a-string-with-no-hands' event. No one could think of a catchier name. Annie thought of Sugar Swingers. 

 

"As far as I'm concerned, there's only one black hole worth studying." Annie waits for Pierce to say something gross, "It's called Sagittarius A, it's located in the centre of our galaxy, and it has the density of 40 suns." Wow, that's actually correct. "Just like my weiner." 

 

There it is. Troy genuinely seems to find that funny. It's weird. Annie knows that he's immature, she just hoped he'd grow up a bit in college. He was good at football and not much else in high school, and that was where all this boyish behaviour stems from. So surely now he's quit football, he should be sensible. It makes sense. Annie's sensitivity came from being ugly and disliked, and now she's pretty, it's gone. Most of the time. 

 

Abed points toward Troy and Pierce, "Pierce and troy didn't get along at first, but now they're bonding through mutual adolescence." She smiles at him and he catches her eye. They haven't spoken in a little while. Not since Abed jokingly told her he was in love with her. Her first time being told that was a joke. That hurts. The more she thought about it, she figured Abed should know her enough to see how that might be difficult to hear. 

 

She ignores him mostly because he hasn't apologised. Which is totally stupid because he did nothing wrong. Not really. He was messing with her and told her that immediately. It's not like she has a crush on Abed. She's missed texting him when good things happen and when she's want to watch a movie but needs a good review of it first. So she's decided it doesn't matter. She can put it to one side to be friendly. 

 

The Dean walks by and knocks on the door with both hands, waving to them all, "Well, look at this group having some kind of meeting and being so diverse. There is just--boy! there is just one of every kind of you, isn't there?" 

 

It's surprising Pierce doesn't know who the Dean is, he's been here for so many years, he'd made student of the decade . He's taken so many classes that most of the teachers and students know him. He must have hit on at least half of them.

 

"I can't believe this. Here I am in a random conversation about football, and I'm talking to Troy Barnes, star quarterback from riverside high. Whoa. Troy, did you know that Greendale has a football team?" Annie is shocked that the Dean would bring that up. Here, Troy is just Troy. Saying Troy isn't followed by a conversation about the latest game or an update of what the great T-bone has been up to. 

 

"Did you know they had a football?" Jeff says. He's in an incredibly irritable mood today. Another day, Annie would ask what's wrong. Right now, she wants the Dean to stop talking about the useless sport of football and leave Troy alone. Things at Greendale have changed him for the better. He's better off without football. He's gone from star to stars. 

 

"Troy," The Dean carries on,  "I was so sorry to hear about your injury. But now that you have recovered, we would love for you to play for the Human Beings." 

 

The conversation spirals into a mess about mascots and the Dean asking Troy to join the Human Beings, with a lot of hand gestures. Annie panics. 

 

"Troy isn't interested in football anymore. Getting injured in that keg stand was the best thing that ever happened to him." 

 

The Dean calls her Troy's hoe. Which is a strange combination of a compliment and insult. She'd like to be his girlfriend, not a hoe. Britta looks pissed that the Dean would use that word about a girl. She folds her arms and screws her mouth up sourly. 

 

Troy chuckles, "Listen, man, no offence, but I was the best, and I finished on top. I wouldn't play for this school with a 10-foot pole." Jeff dismisses the Dean and he thankfully leaves the group on their own, telling Troy to think about it. Which he won't. 

 

"Now let's meet the minimum requirements for a language credit, shall we?" Jeff smiles and Shirley stands up. 

 

"Yes, but I need to go to the bathroom first. Uh, Britta?" Britta says no so Annie offers to join her. She could use with some girly talk about Troy. Britta doesn't seem to understand that when someone asks you to come to the bathroom, they want to talk to you. 

 

"I don't think Britta likes me." Shirley squeezes her arm and shakes her head in sadness. 

 

"Of course she does," Annie assures her, "She's just not used to being around women like-" 

 

Shirley raises her eyebrows, "Like?" She demands. 

 

"Like you.  A strong feminine women. She thinks it's a oxymoron." Britta wants to be strong, but thinks she has to be manly to do that. She told Annie that no one will take her seriously if she wears skirts and flowers. Annie is strong. And wearing dresses makes her feel stronger. More confident. That's what's important about what you wear, how it makes you feel. 

 

"Mm. She needs some girl friends." Shirley agrees, heading into the bathroom. Annie repins and brushes through her hair. 

 

"So," Annie hesitates, "what do you think about Troy starting football." 

 

"That boy needs his time for studying." Annie smiles at that. "But it wouldn't hurt him to help his college." 

 

Annie glowers at herself in the mirror, "It would hurt him! In high school, he was mean and rude and..." She trails off. She liked Troy in high school. Why? She sighs. "He wasn't the same person." She wanted the most popular boy in the school because she was a dorky outcast with no friends, she thought he was different inside. Now it's more than that. 

 

"That's not good." She washes her hands next to Annie. There's got to be a way to convince Troy not to even think about the team. If she throws more astrology work at him, that might work. He'll see how far he's come in his classes once he aces that test. 

 

On their way to their next lesson, Jeff, Troy, and Annie are heading in the same direction. Annie spot the trophy cabinet and slows down. Jeff spots the singular trophy. This is perfect. Troy would never play for such a bad team. Riverside high had one of the best and well respected teams in the nearby areas. A star shouldn't have to play for a terrible team. She can see Troy's reflection in the ghost cabinet. It's blank. 

 

" You sure you made the right call on the football team, Troy? It looks like they won something once: most valued customer.  
Henderson trophy cases." Annie could thank Jeff on the spot for saying that. 

 

" - so we should still study a little more astronomy later, right? Maybe over some milky ways or some mars bars." She can hear her inside voices telling her to shut up. 

 

"Or pancakes." Troy suggests. Pancakes are good? Troy definitely needs time to focus on lessons. 

 

++++ 

 

Abed knows how to lay low. He did it all through high school and his first few days at Greendale. There are a just a few simple rules of laying low. He can be close enough to his friends that they see him, but not close enough to start a conversation. He can't completely disappear or that would be a cause for them to worry. He can't wear anything interesting or be doing anything interesting that might start it's own plot line or spark excitment when people see him. He explains his to Annie, who found him seeking around the library. 

 

"You're talking to me." She points out. 

 

"You'd worry if I didn't. It's allowed." He glances around to make sure no one else is around. He doesn't want to start a group discussion. 

 

"Right. So why are you laying low again?" 

 

Abed doesn't want people to get bored of him. He's been trying so hard to make friends with everyone, he needs some time to watch TV shows and have some time alone, "Jeff pointed out I can weird out the group with my TV comments."

 

Annie looks confused, "Jeff's an ass. You don't weird anyone out." 

 

"I don't mind laying low." Abed shrugs and gets out a boring book from the shelf. A Spanish textbook. One he has in his bag. If he takes one out that's different or new, he might stumble upon a story of some kind. Start something new. Find a hidden coded message on the front cover that leads to treasure. 

 

"Can we talk?" She says, not wanting to go however long this is going to go on for without chatting with him, "Can I text you?" 

 

He smiles, "Sure." He wants to ask why she looks worries, and what's happening with her at the moment in her lessons. If she liked the movie 'The assassin' that she watched last night. He can't talk for that long though. He says bye without asking anything.

 

Laying low used to be easier when he didn't have any friends. 

 

++++ 

 

Annie leans closer to Troy, using his text book rather than her own. Britta and Shirley join them in the cafeteria.When Britta and Shirley both leaves, Annie goes back to helping Troy. Studying with Troy is fun. She laughs a lot more than when she studies on her own. 

 

Jeff comes over to talk to Troy. This group should take a lesson from Abed and learn how to lay low for a while and not disturb the obvious connecting of two young people in love. 

 

"We're busy." Annie tells him through gritted teeth. 

 

"I'll bring him back." Annie looks down at the work in disappointment. She watched Jeff talk to Troy by the vending machines, wanting to know what they're talking about. It's worrying. Jeff never takes an interest. 

 

They leave the cafeteria and Annie starts wondering if Troy will leave her waiting long. Britta and Shirley don't come back to see her. She nibbles at her sandwich and reads through some notes. To stop herself checking the time every twenty second, she texts Abed. 

 

  
**HOW'S LAYING LOW?**   **XX**  Annie texts and sends. 

 

  
**OKAY.** He replies almost immediately. At least someone doesn't keep her waiting. 

 

**I CAN'T ASK YOU WHAT YOU'RE DOING, RIGHT? XX**

**NOT REALLY. ARE YOU OKAY?**

**TROY LEFT ME WHEN WE WERE STUDYING. I'M TRYING TO HELP. XX**

 

**HE IS GRATEFUL FOR THE HELP. WANT ME TO COME KEEP YOU COMPANY?**

She sighs, watching the door to see if she can see Troy or Jeff.   **THAT'S NOT EXACTLY LAYING LOW. XX**  


 

**THAT'S NOT EXACTLY AN ANSWER.**

**IT'S OKAY, ABED. YOU DON'T HAVE TO DO THAT. XX**

**I KNOW.**

She doesn't know how to reply to that, so she puts her phone down. She's about to leave, maybe go see if she can find Shirley and ask her to tell Jeff off, or maybe to see Abed, when she spots Troy strutting down the cafeteria. He doesn't even look guilty! 

 

"Troy, I've been waiting for an hour!" She says when he's close enough to hear her. 

 

"It's all right, I'm worth it." He starts dancing and Annie feels like crying. They're meant to be friends and he left her waiting for an hour without even texting. And now he's not going to say sorry! 

 

"Why are you doing a politically conservative high school shamefully outdated fight rap? Have you been playing football?" There's a lump in her throat. Her face feels hot. 

 

"Threw the skin around a couple of times. Still got it." He pretends to throw his stupid football, making equally stupid noises. 

 

"But you knew we had an astronomy test tomorrow." Annie tells him. But you knew we were meant to be studying, she means. 

 

"Class blows. What I need to know about the universe is that I'm at the centre of it." That's so inaccurate  Annie can't even explain how wrong. He doesn't give her the chance either, he stands rapping at people on nearby tables. 

 

"Troy! Stop! Don't become this person again. This isn't the real you. This is the arrogant jock that totally ignored the only people that truly liked him for non-superficial reasons but weren't allowed to say anything because their parents are bigots!" She gets her her feet and tries to get through to him. 

 

"Huh?" 

 

"Football is bad for you, Troy!" Please, she silently begs, please see that. Things can't go back to how they were in high school. She can't go back to being the idiotic girl with an unrealistic crush on a football player who is so self-centred he can't see past his own feet and can only really care about himself. 

 

"Jeff said you'd say that." What kind of ideas has Jeff been filling Troy's head with! 

 

"Jeff, what now?" 

 

She throws herself down onto the cafeteria chair, putting her forehead down on the table with a bang. Miserably, she looks up to see a few people staring at her. "Bite me." She mutters and gets up, leaving Troy's books and things on the table. He can deal with his own stuff. She's not helping him. 

 

She picks up her phone and text Abed again. 

 

**I KNOW YOU'RE LAYING LOW, BUT DO YOU KNOW WHY TROY JOINED THE FOOTBALL TEAM AGAIN? XX**

 

  
**JEFF.** Reads Abed's simple response. 

 

**WHY? XX**

**THE DEAN NEEDS TROY TO PLAY. HE'S GOT JEFF TO TALK TO TROY. PIERCE TOLD BRITTA. I OVERHEARD.**

**THANKS! XX**

 

She finds Jeff in his next lessons, watching him through the door's window. The teacher must be able to see him texting under the table. She walks behind him when he leaves the class, and takes a path opposite to him. When she realises confronting him will work better than stalking, she pushes through the bushes to the other path. 

 

"I've been following you. How much did the dean pay you to make troy play football?" 

 

"I'm not having a conversation with someone who emerges from a bush." 

 

"Because I'm right." She walks quickly to keep up with him. ,

 

"No. Because I'm not in a breakfast commercial." he stops, "Look, the Dean has pictures of me, okay? Horrible pictures of me attending his school." Annie has no sympathy for someone who would purposely hurt his friend. 

 

"And for that you'd convince Troy to flush his life down football's toilet again? Britta's right, you are the most selfish person alive! And all that is gonna end right now. Because I'm telling him what kind of friend you really are." Troy needs to know why Jeff is 'helping' him. 

 

"Maybe you should tell him you're hopelessly in love with him." She feels like she's been slapped. "High school must have been tough, huh? Waiting for a superstar to notice you. But here, here he's all alone, and he needs so much help! Did you enrol in all of his classes, or were you worried that might freak him out? The important thing is that you are there for him." 

 

Annie feels like she's five again and a teacher is telling her off. It's horrible. Humiliating. No one is meant to know she's in love with Troy, "The important thing is that you are the only one there for him. And you don't really care what he wants just as long as you don't have to share him with the rest of the world. Because, really, you are just as selfish as I am. You're just not as good at it yet." 

 

She can't believe Jeff could be so cruel or harsh. She stares at his feet, thinking of what to say in her defence. "You're right. I could never be as good as you." She wants Troy to be the best of himself. At high school, his friends only liked him for his fame, his grades were terrible and he was a jerk. At Greendale, he's so much better than that transparent jock. Here he has them. "Probably because I actually care." 

 

Annie does care about Troy. As his friend, not just because she likes him. "Profound. But technically meaningless." Jeff snips back. 

 

She turns and storms towards the cafeteria, ignoring what Jeff calls after her about not feeling guilty. He doesn't need to feel guilty. He should just fix his mistake and get Troy to stop playing football. 

 

Shirley is sat in one of the comfy arm chairs, "Shirley, will you please come to the bathroom with me?" She asks, but doesn't stop to wait because if she does she'll cry in front of everyone. Britta walks in, "Where's Shirley?" 

 

"Shirley's not coming but I'm here to listen, girl." She doesn't look at Britta. People shouldn't have to see her upset. 

 

"Why do we inflict so much pain on ourselves for men?" She knows Britta will think she's dumb for liking a boy. 

 

"I don't know, Sweetie. Maybe it's because men make the world go round? Kleenex?"

 

"I've been infatuated with Troy. Now he's joining football. Now he'll have his pick of the litter and I'll never get to be with him!" Hearing it out loud sounds so high school she starts crying. Everything is the way it was. She'll turn into a work-addicted friendless loser, Troy will be the star football player and she'll pine over him while he makes other girls swoon. 

 

"Oh, Annie, screw him! There are guys out there that would kill to be with you." Annie knows there's not. She thinks of Abed, thinking that being in love with her is a joke. Britta continues, "And if Troy isn't one of them, that's him failing your standards. You got that?"

 

"You're right." She wipes her eyes with the tissues. This isn't high school. Troy is her friend and he's not that jock again. "I can't control him. And if I truly cared about him, I wouldn't want to." Troy can make his own decisions about what he wants to do. If he thinks football is important, maybe it is. "Thanks for talking to me, Britta." 

 

+++ 

 

First things first, she texts Abed and asks him to meet her in the study room. She waits for him to turn up, and laying low is not an excuse. He turns up, looking a little shy. 

 

"Annie." He waves and she folds her arms. 

 

"I have something to say." She holds her chin up and pushes her shoulders back to look powerful, "I was really upset you told me you loved me as a joke. It wasn't nice. It wasn't funny and I think it was mean." 

 

Abed waits for her to finish. She swallows, not really prepared for him to not respond. "It is  _not_  unbelievable that someone is in love with me. I am strong, and smart and nice. And I wasn't always pretty so no one may have ever asked me to prom, or had a crush on me, or even talked to me in high school but that doesn't mean they wouldn't now!" Her speech has escalated more than she wanted. She's yelling. When she's finished, she takes a deep breath. 

 

"I wasn't-" Abed starts and fidgets, "I didn't know no one had-" He looks uncomfortable. There's a pause. He didn't know? That seems unlikely. Everyone knows she was a pill addicted loser. Like someone would have a crush on her. 

 

"You're beautiful, Annie. I know you're smart and nice. The unbelievable part is that no one ever saw that. I'm sorry for joking around with you. It was mean." He sounds so calm, even though she just yelled at him again for some silly reason. 

 

"I'm sorry, Abed." She hugs him, and he brushes his fingers along the back of her head. "I'm just upset." 

 

"About Troy?" She steps back to look up at him. "You like him."

 

Annie tucks her hair behind her ears, and nods.Might as well be honest. 

 

"I hope it works out." Abed says quietly. 

 

Annie's not too sure. Troy can't seem to see past the nerdy Annie from Riverside. At the moment, she'll settle for supportive friend. 

 

"So... do you want to help me support Troy at his football game?" 

 

++

 

It takes a few hours to make the sign with flowers and neat writing. Abed's artistic for someone who does not take or do art. He's as clueless about football as Annie is. 'No one ever wanted him to be on their team' he explains. 

 

"I would have picked you." Annie pats his shoulder, "If we'd gone to high school together." He seems happy with that little offer, as useless as it is. 

 

"I would have asked you to Prom." He says, just as useless. 

 

Annie stands up, and grabs a red marker from the table. "I, Annie, promise to never not pick you to be on my team." 

 

"What are you doing?" He stands up. 

 

"A blood pact." She draws a line across her index finger with red, "I'd rather not use real blood. So we were outcasts in high school, that doesn't mean we are now. Now we have friends we can do stuff with. Like prom and football." 

 

Abed takes the pen from her to mark across his own finger. He presses the pad of his finger against hers. She'll never feel as though she can't go out because there's no one to talk to her. Just because high school was hard, it shouldn't stop her experiencing what she missed. Abed should do the same. 

 

"You should sign up for football. They'll let you on their team." 

 

Abed tilts his head to the side and thinks about it, "Being left out of sport may have been a good part of being a loner." Annie laughs. There were good parts about high school when she thinks about it. She never got drunk and threw up in her shower, or got grounded, or got her heart broken by an actual guy. Unrequited, unnoticed love is easier to maintain. As long as she never tells Troy, she can't be rejected. 

 

There's just a few aspects she would have changed. Like having friends who talk to her, even when they're laying low and don't want to be disturbed. Ones who were there for her when she was upset, and to give her someone to talk to when she needs it. 

 

She would have liked to have a friend like Abed at high school. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back at college in a few days so updates may slow down. Hopefully should be posting a new chapter every few days! Thanks for all your comments and kudos.


	7. Introduction to Statistics

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abed spontaneously is asked for Annie's help getting Jeff to come to her party. Abed stands up for his friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter sort of got away from me. It ended up being a lot more out of the episode with a lot more Annie x Abed.

There's a knock on Abed's dorm room door, loud enough to wake him up from his deep sleep. He checks his bedside clock he keeps in his bed, groaning at the time. He's wearing pyjama pants and an old t-shirt when he answers the door, pushing his hair out of his face. Annie's standing there, looking bright for such an early morning wake up call. 

 

"Abed! Great, you're awake! I'm having a party!" She winds round him to get into his dorm and sets her folders onto the table. She's in college gear, a summer top and shirt with her hair pinned back. Seemingly looking sane. 

 

"It's five in the morning." Abed clears his throat, husky from sleepiness. His eyes feel heavy. Maybe he's dreaming. He must be, because Annie doesn't barge into his college room when they have class the next day to say she's having a party. 

 

"I know, I'm sorry." She bends her knees and tilts her head to look sweet so he'll forgive her. She spreads some folders out and grabs a sheet of colorful diagrams and printed test. A mindmap. He reads the centre. "Day of the dead?" 

 

"Mexican Halloween!" Annie squeals, clapping her hands and bouncing up and down on the sofa cushions. "It's going to be fun! I can get extra credit, have all my friends in one place, and spend Halloween with all you guys!" 

 

Abed "I was going to watch batman." And eat candy. Troy's coming round.

 

"Please, Abed. You can be batman!" She looks up, her cheeks and nose pink from excitment. She looks so thrilled with her idea. It makes it impossible to say no. 

 

"Okay." Abed says, "Can I go to sleep now?" 

 

"No! I've sent out e-vites for everyone but I don't know how to get Jeff to come! He'll say it's lame!" 

 

Abed doesn't get what's important about Jeff coming. Annie seems to think it is. 

 

She rolls her eyes when he doesn't respond, "He's part of our group. I want everyone to be there! My new family all together celebrating a holiday!" 

 

"Okay. Just tell him that." Abed sits down and rests his head against the back of the sofa, tucking his feet underneath a cushion. They have Spanish in a few hours. It's a college night. 

 

"That won't work. Jeff will just pat my head and say 'next time' or something. He probably doesn't even think Mexican Halloween is a holiday." 

 

She makes a list of things she needs to get while he thinks. When Abed is a little more alert, he can think of better ideas. Ones that work. He gets up, and gets into characters. Relaxed Jeff. I-don't-care Jeff. Cool Jeff. 

 

"Okay. Jeff wants to be cool, right? He'll be the cool guy at the party." He waves for Annie to get up. "Say you need him to be there because otherwise there will be no party." 

 

"Oh! Appeal to his dominate side?" Annie flexes her arms out and nods, pumping herself up like she would to ask the real Jeff. 

 

"Or tell him you'll wear something tight." Abed suggests, and Annie slaps his arm gently. 

 

"Abed!" she scolds. As much as Annie ignores it, Jeff would happily spend an evening eyeing Annie up in a short, tight costume. Not question about it. 

 

"Okay. I'm Jeff. What do you say?" 

 

"Jeff! Can you please come to my party tonight because that would be nice of you-" 

 

"Woah, Annie." Abed stops her, "I can't go. Tonight? Tonight I'm doing laundry. Darn, another time." 

 

Annie looks impressed, "You really sound like Jeff. You be me. What should I say?" 

 

Abed isn't in the mind set for Annie. He changes characters, thinking of how to act like Annie. Smart, anxious, nice, up-tight. "Jeff, you're coming to my party tonight. It's our first holiday as a family. It'll be a blast! No excuses." 

 

"Um," Annie tries to think of a Jeff like excuse, "Can't. Busy doing... um, Britta?" Her voice goes really high and she winces. "I'm not a good Jeff. I'm busy watching a movie." 

 

"A movie can wait." Abed says as Annie, "Be at the party tonight and be a good friend and show Britta that you care about something." 

 

Annie deflates from her excitment and tosses herself back onto the sofa, grabbing a pillow and chucking it at Abed. "This isn't working. Can you talk to Jeff for me?" 

 

He could, but then Annie won't learn a valuable lesson in standing up to Jeff. She'll be frustrated if she doesn't do it herself. "You can do it. It's Jeff, he's your friend. Make him feel sorry for you if he doesn't agree. He feels guilt." 

 

"Yeah." Abed sits down next to Annie. "You're right. I'm stressing too much about this." She rests her head back against the sofa. Within a minute, her breath steadies and she's asleep. 

 

+++ 

 

Annie wakes up when Abed's alarm goes off. Annoying beeping alarm. Later than she would usually wake up. Her hair is a mess and her shirt is creased and Abed turns off his alarm without opening his eyes. "Abed?" she shakes him on the top bunk. He's covering his head with his duvet. "Abed?" He shakes him more and he sits up suddenly, turning to face her. 

 

His eyes are wide and he looks asleep. "Annie?" He asks wearily, looking down at her and starting to focus. She smooths out her hair with her fingers, tugging out the knots. She straightened it this morning before she came here. She hadn't sleep, she'd spent all night putting together decorations for her day of the dead. 

 

"Yeah. Can I borrow a shirt and an iron?" She asks and he slowly nods, coming to life. He looks puzzled at why she'd need to borrow them. 

 

"Second draw. And somewhere in that corner." He gets up, making a vague gesture towards the corner. He looks tired and Annie feels guilty for waking him up early this morning. It's just that she needed help and Greendale leave the door open to the dorms. He knows everyone so well he can predict how to manipulate them. 

 

She looks through Abed's draws, which are a mess inside, for one to wear. When she finds one, she pulls off her cardigan and unbuttons her shirt, facing with her back towards Abed. "Turn around." She asks and Abed faces the wall. She pulls her shirt off quickly and puts Abed's cosy one on. It's baggy and smells like him. Like lemon grass and college soap. The iron is brand new. He doesn't have an ironing board so she makes do with a towel underneath. Old Annie would have totally worn this t-shirt. It's comfy and a cute pastel purple colour, with little dots of colour on the front. 

 

Abed turns around when she says it's okay. "It suits you." 

 

New Annie wears shirts and dresses. She shows off her figure and wears bright things to draw people's attention, rather than trying to hide. She pins her hair back so people can see her face. Facing Jeff today, she needs all the confidence she can get. He has to come to the party, it's important to her. Abed goes off to the communal bathroom to get dressed and washed. 

 

Usually on November 2nd, her brother and her watch scary movies and eat left over Halloween candy. This year, she'll be on her own. It's the first year without her brother being there to celebrate the day. This party means she can stay out late with her new Greendale family and not go home until after midnight, on the third of November. Then it won't matter they're not doing things together anymore. She's not going to call home today. 

 

Her Mother agreed to talk to her. Once Abed told her she should, she gave it a shot. It was an awkward conversation that lasted about a minute. Her Mother asked her what she was wearing and whether she'd finally outgrown her bangs. She tried to tell her about Greendale but her Mom said she had to go. The wound is open between them. It needs time now. She made the first move, her Mother has to make the second. 

 

Annie fixes her shirt and packs away the iron before swapping her shirts again. She folds Abed's shirt and lays it on carefully back into his draw. He walks back in with his hair damp and a clean t-shirt on. 

 

"Feeling better?" He asks, packing a few books into his notepad. She pulls on her shoes that are by the door. 

 

"Yeah. Sorry for barging in here so early." 

 

"Any time." He stands up and shrugs on his bag. "Ready?" 

 

"Do you have a mint?" 

 

Abed goes into his top draw and tosses her a packet of peppermint life savers. Abed locks his dorm as she sucks on one. They taste nice and she offers him back the packet. He takes one but tells her to keep the rest. She's got several halloween decorations in her bag and they're digging into her back as she walks. 

 

"I have to go see Señor Chang. Meet you in class?" She waves goodbye and heads off to find her teacher. She has a party to plan. 

 

+++ 

 

Abed shakes his head a couple of times to wake up during Spanish. As much as last night helped Annie, focusing on class is harder today when his head is somewhere else. At home in bed. Under his warm sheets with his thick pillow that feels soft against his cheeks. His squashy mattress with the torn hole in the corner. His eyes drift shut and he opens them again before Chang notices. 

 

Annie announces her party, which will be a great success. He'll go as batman. Hero of the night. Man of the black skies. 

 

He doesn't need to reply to the e-vite. Annie knows he'll go. It'll be his first college party. First ever party. He never got invited to one in high school. Which was cool because he wasn't. 

 

He goes to the canteen and spots Pierce and Troy. It's nice to have people he can go sit with. 

 

"Taking a pill?" he asks, taking an interest in Pierce. They haven't bonded yet, due to disinterest in the same activities and that Pierce refers to him as 'Abed the Arab'. 

 

"Yes, I am." 

 

Abed tries to be funny by telling a story about his Grampa. They don't laugh. Serves him right for expecting to be funny when most of his humour is from 'strange cuteness' as most people put it. Troy laughs at Pierce's joke easily. He'll stick to being strange. 

 

+++

 

Annie has to make a last minute dash to the costume store during Greendale hours when she'd usually be working on outstanding projects. She buys a cute skeleton outfit with a long black cape. Maybe Abed and her will match. Batman wears a cape, right? Everyone says they'll come in costume, although she only knows about Abed's choice; the rest will be a spooky surprise! He already has a batman outfit -she doesn't question it- and texts her to ask what he can bring. She asks him to pick up some glitter and his laptop so she can play some music. 

 

Troy's bringing cookies, Shirley's baked some sweet treats, Britta is bringing cups and plates, Pierce just has to remember himself. She's told everyone they're welcome to bring food and drink that's not alcohol. No one is throwing up or getting wasted at her party. It takes a few hours to make the food but she's got the afternoon free of classes. Shirley helps her to decorate the study room with spooky things before going home to change. She seems overly excited for the party. Things are going perfectly. 

 

People slowly start to arrive. Annie greets everyone and encourages them to get some food and drink and prepare for an evening of fun and Spanish. Chang arrives with a clipboard to give people extra credit. She know it's his free time but he's a teacher. This is part of his job. Troy arrives, looking handsome ina red suit and fake moustache. Britta looks adorable in a squirrel outfit. 

 

Jeff doesn't wear a costume. Which annoys her. He could have made an effort. Between learning Spanish to talk about the day of the dead and serving guests, she's barely thinking of home. People congratulate her on the party. It's turning out really good. The  _Dance of the Dead_ is going to be the best dance of the dead people have seen yet. 

 

For once, she's done something that hasn't gone wrong. 

 

++++ 

 

Abed's enjoying the party. Troy is asking him questions about batman. Annie runs up to him and asks Batman to set up the laptop and music for the dance of the dead. He agree, it'll get him out of dancing himself. 

 

"Okay, it's time for the "dance of the dead"." Annie announces, "Everyone form a circle. Lights. Music." 

 

"Is it under genre or on a specific playlist?" He searches through the list Annie send him. She's looking very hot in her skeleton outfit. His batman costume came in handy. Annie comes over to look for the specific song and they find it. She walks back over to the group. 

 

"Now for the first dance, I'd like to invite a very special guest to the floor. Jeff Winger? Jeff? Where's Jeff?" She looks around for Jeff. It was important to Annie that Jeff be here. 

 

He notices Pierce rubbing Annie's shoulders. He's acting weirdly. He steps up to Troy. "Is Pierce okay?" He asks, as batman. It's his job to care about the civilians. Troy watches them. 

 

Troy goes to talk to Pierce and Abed goes to Annie. "It's a good party." He assures her. She's got that look on her face. The freaking out, panic mode face. 

 

"Annie?" 

 

She puts her hands up her her mouth, "I'm Little Annie Adderoll! The same loser who will never be popular with the cool kids." 

 

Abed doesn't know what to say so he just pats her arm and lets her have a moment to be sad. She drops her hands, "Everyone's leaving." 

 

"I'm not." He assures her, in his Abed voice, not batman. She goes to sit down for a while and Abed walks up to Troy, pulling him away from Pierce. 

 

"Come on. We're leaving." 

 

+++ 

 

It's not hard to find Jeff at the party. He's chatting to Professor Slater. As batman, he needs to help Annie. 

 

"Jeff, you must return to Annie's party. She's feeling unpopular." He warns him, making an effort to sound threatening. This needs to be quick. The longer they're there, the longer Annie is alone and feeling bad. 

 

"Jeff, Pierce took something, and he is tripping balls. He is touching people and dancing weird. It's like grumpy old men but not hilarious." Troy adds. 

 

Saying he's at a grown up party is not good enough. "Oh no." If Jeff wants to stay here, they won't be able to get him back to Annie's party. 

 

"I want you guys out of here. Britta, I don't care about your high school soap opera. Abed, you're not Batman." Tonight he's batman. That's the glory of Mexican Halloween. He's just being rude so they'll leave him to flirt with his professor girl to make Britta jealous. Because all Jeff cares about is himself. Not Annie; who only wants Jeff to hang out with her for one night so she can throw a great party for everyone, or his other friends who need help. 

 

"I know I'm not Batman. You could try not being a jerk." 

 

Annie deserves better friends than him. They all do. 

 

+++++ 

 

Pierce comes in acting weird to the party. Everyone vacant the room when he starts screaming loudly, covering his ears and throwing chairs. She watches helplessly as he piles tables ans chairs to the middle of the room, simultaneously trying to calm her guests down. Talking to Pierce doesn't help, he keeps insisting he wants to talk to Jeff. Who left. And is not coming back. She knows the group went to find him. 

 

"Guys!" She calls when she sees them return, without Jeff, "Help!" Abed walks over quickly and looks at the situation. 

 

"It's okay, Annie." he says, low and husky. "I'm going to go through the other door and get him out." 

 

Annie nods and turns back to the chair pile with Pierce inside it. Shirley gives her a big hug and pats her hair. She breaks the news about her husband to Annie, who in turn tells her how sorry she is. Shirley shouldn't have an ex-husband. No one should ever betray her trust or mistreat her. 

 

Jeff comes in to talk to Pierce, and she can't imagine why he came back, except that he truly cares about them all. 

 

When the chair fort starts to fall, she's so afraid she freezes. All she can do is watch as her best friends might be crushed to death. She sees a blur of black as Abed swoops into the fort, dragging Pierce and Jeff out by their collars until they're safe. The fort collapses in on itself, and she stares at Abed. Batman. He just saved Pierce and Jeff's life. 

 

He really is a hero. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all should check out this amazing edit my qmalfoy (tumblr url) who made the most amazing edit for this fic. You can check it out here: http://romancenovel.co.vu/post/128818331176/probably-maybe-almost-by-annpxrkins-annie-and


	8. Home Economics

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie tries to help Troy with his date, while simultaneously pining over him. Abed deals with an unwanted roomie.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, sorry for the delay in the new chapter. Things got a little hectic. Will be trying to update more frequently.

Abed sits at the front of the class room today, next to Annie. She's easy to spot in a bright yellow cardigan. Sitting next to Jeff has gotten a little slow recently, since all he does is text and copy Abed's notes. He thought Jeff would be the source of adventures, but maybe that's only when they're collectively in a group. Annie passes him a note during the lesson, asking if he's going to the 'night under the stars'. He didn't plan on going and shakes his head. 'Why?' he mouths. She scribes another note. She was going to ask the group to go. Abed wouldn't mind going as a group.

Chang wakes Jeff up from a nap loudly and dismisses class. He walks out pretty quickly, thinking of the group. Lately, things have slowed down. He's busy making films to hang out with Troy too much, there's no more 'will they, won't they' with Jeff and Britta, it doesn't look like Annie and Troy will work things out. Maybe they need a new thing. Like starting a new hobby together. There's a great place down town where you can get any pet you can think of. Legal or not. A side kick snake. 

The study room is empty so Abed sits down. He starting making a fortune teller in class, writing their names on the very inside. For eight slots, he had to add Chang. He then writes situations on each of the inner folds- fights, kisses, starts a band, shares plots- and finally writes times on the outside. Tomorrow, next week, in the future. He starts playing with it, pushing his fingers in and out. He knows where each of the people are. 

Tomorrow. Fights. Jeff and Britta. 

Next month. Starts a band. Annie and Shirley. 

Next week. Kisses. Troy and Annie. 

The problem with the fortune teller is that Abed knows who's who and can pick and choose the outcomes. And the outcomes are limited. Britta walks in and Abed holds out the fortune teller to her. "Pick one." He holds out the origami to her and she shrugs. 

"I don't know, Abed." She pats his shoulders, "Let's just study, 'kay?" 

He goes back to playing with his fortune teller until Annie walks in. She looks upset, her lip stuck out and eyes cast down to the floor. Both thumbs are pressed against either strap of her bag, which she only does when she's excited or sad. 

"Abed, can I talk to you?" Annie asks. 

He nods, "Sure." There's a pause and Annie raises her eyebrows sternly at him. "Oh, you mean outside. Sure." 

Annie drags him by his wrist out to the library, "Um, Abed? Do you know a girl called Randi?" The yellow colour of her cardigan hurts his eyes to state at. Her lip gloss has been applied recently, her mouth shiny and pink. 

Randi, Troy's mentioned copying homework from a girl called Randi. "Black hair? Tall?" 

"Is she cute?" Annie asks suddenly. Abed opens his mouth to speak, hesitating. She's definitely hot. Curvy legs, nice breasts, shiny hair. Not that Annie would like to hear that. 

"No." He lies. Annie smiles at him.

"Okay." She sighs, "Is she nice?" Annie plays with the ends of her hair, pushing locks around her fingers and gently rocking back on her feet. 

"I'm not sure. Is this to do with Troy?" 

She folds her arms. Part of Abed wishes he'd not said it immediately, the rest of him wishes seconds later when she starts to cry. He holds out his hands in a stop gesture, "Please don't be upset. I'm sorry!" She blinks a few times and tries not to cry. 

"I just...don't know what to do! Do I give up? I really, really like him, Abed. I've liked him for years." She gets a tissue from her bag and dries her eyes, "I'm sorry. You don't need this. It's just been a long morning. My landlord got shot again and the heater broke in my flat, there's ice on the inside of the walls." She starts to get weepy again so Abed just nods and tries to look sad too. Show sympathy. She hugs him, pressing her cheek against his shoulder. 

When he had a breakdown as a kid, his Mother would stroke his hair and make calm shushing noises. Sometimes she'd sing him a song. He doesn't know any songs Annie would like that he knows, but he strokes her hair, "It's okay. It'll be okay." 

She steps back, wiping her eyes. "Thanks." She says quietly. 

"As far as Troy goes, I recommend asking Shirley. For your apartment, buy an extra lock for the door and I know a caretaker on campus who would do anything for twenty bucks. He'll fix your heater." 

As he's saying this, Shirley and Britta come running towards the study room. They spot the two of them standing by the door and beckon them inside. They follow and Britta announces that they have news.

"What is it?" Troy asks, looking bored already.

Britta checks the coast is clear, "Jeff is living in his car."

That's not the intense, action thrilled plot line Abed was hoping for, but it's a start. The opening scene before the intro song so to say. The group start to all collapse into conversation, talking over each other about this situation. Turns out Britta and Shirley caught Jeff brushing his teeth and showering on campus. Technically Abed showers and brushes his teeth on campus too. 

They calm down, agreeing to calmly discuss the matter with Jeff when he arrives-late as per usual- so to not upset him or damage his fragile ego. 

After five minutes Annie announces she's going to start doing work, "How can he live on campus and still be late?" 

Pierce starts telling a story and living in his car and AIDS and then Britta's hippie ex-boyfriend which doesn't interest Abed at all. He start playing with paper again, glancing up only to see if Annie seems okay. She seem better now. When Jeff walks in, she doesn't even look up until Shirley yells that he's living in his car. Living in a car sounds cool. No bills. No mail. Less space to tidy up. The only down side is parking fees. And Abed can't drive. 

"Stay with me." he offers, "My room has a bunk bed, which is a misnomer because it's the real deal." It's not as though Jeff would be the first of the group to stay over at his house. Annie has slept there. He starts heading off to his dorm room to do some studying, maybe watch a movie when Annie chases after him, catching him up. 

"I'm going to talk to Shirley, but I wanted to say thanks for being a good friend." Abed nods, happy to be good at something. Having friends is new to him, he wants to get it right because these people are people he wants to be in his life for a long time. 

When he's back at his dorm for barely an hour when there's a knock on the door, he gets up to see a beaten Jeff Winger standing there. "Can I live with you?"

He doesn't even need to think about it. Helping friends is what friends do. "Yeah." 

*******

After Annie explains the situation fully to Shirley, there's a lot of hugs and 'bless you, child' that makes Annie feel about seven again. However, she does feel better for getting it all off her chest. Shirley knew a lot of what was going on, but she listens intently to every word Annie says, responding appropriately and nicely. 

"You realise you cannot help this boy plan his date." Shirley advises her, they've moved to the canteen and ordered coffee. Annie cups her between his fingers, stirring it slowly. 

"I know. But it's Troy. I want him to be happy." 

"Screw happy, you should want him to be yours." Shirley nods viciously, and Annie can imagine her giving the same speech to her boys when they get their first crushes. "He's not the brightest cookie in the jar, you've got to tell him how you feel." 

"Oh." Annie's chest hurts. She can't be having a heart attack. The idea of telling Troy after so long freaks her out. If he rejects her, she has to see him every day knowing he doesn't feel the same way. If he likes her. She doesn't know what she'd do. When she thinks of Troy, she imagines him telling her how he's always loved her. How he did notice her in high school. It doesn't get any further than that. She's only ever had one boyfriend, and it was nothing special. A couple of dates and the it one night that made Annie determined never to date a boy unless that boy is Troy. Troy Barnes would not cry during sex. 

"Yeah." Annie tries to sound positive. "I can tell him." Even she knows she's lying. There's no way she can tell Troy how she feels. It's not just the high school thing, it's that he's so fiercely confident. Compared to Troy, Annie is the same shy nerd as she was last year. He pushes time back, rewinds her clock. Little Annie Aderall; outcast in high school. Those words that taunted her through the last few month of school are difficult to forget. They were true. Even the outcasts didn't let Annie sit with them. She was too weird. Too ugly. Too Annie. 

She leaves Shirley to get to class, mindlessly sitting through her class and taping the lecture rather than listening.

++ 

_"Hey, Edison." Anita Jones had tapped her shoulder in the class, "How much of you is even real?"_

_"W-what?" Annie stuttered, looking up from her books. She clenches the book between her fingers, and the edges slice into her skin, leaving red marks._

_Anita shrugs, her long hair fluttering around her heart-shaped face. She's at least a foot taller than Annie, and much prettier. "Well, most of you is held together by metal. Are you, like, a robot?" She giggles. "Kidding, Edison. Don't look so sad. I'm just teasing."_

_Annie smiles meekly through her braces, which probably looks more like a grimace._

_"Never mind. You can't get upset if you're not a real girl!" The group of girls around her start to laugh. That was how the rumour of plastic surgery started. Apparently Annie wore a back brace and the 'braces' were to keep her jaw together after a blotched plastic surgery operation. No one at school, not even the teachers thought this wasn't true. A popular girl's whisper is gospel._

++

Annie blinks away her thoughts, slowing returning to the lecture where she should be. A robot. It suits her, she thinks bitterly. After all, she's only ever loved one boy and maybe not even then. Can you really love someone you don't know? Since she's become Troy's friend, has her crush lessened or gotten worse? She doesn't know how she feels, except she knows she doesn't want him to go on a date with another girl. Helping him plan a date for another girl feels wrong. 

Greendale doesn't offer her a lot of opportunities, but finding out if Troy is worth her feelings is one of them. 

****

Abed gets bored of Jeff whining after three minutes. It's like having his Father around again. Telling him to turn the TV down, complaining about the size/smell/pathetic nature of the room and walking in front of the TV.

 

He texts Annie the next morning. HELP ME. There's no way he can live with Jeff around. It's nice to have the company, but unless Jeff can relax and enjoy this, it's not going to work. His phone vibrates and he checks it, watching Jeff pace across his living room looking for a number to get some quick cash. 

 

KNOCK KNOCK. XX Is her response. 

 

WHO'S THERE? 

 

JEFF! :D DON'T ANSWER THE DOOR! XX

 

He smiles, despite the awkward position he's been put in by having to comfort Jeff in a moment of loss. To be honest, he doesn't get why his friend is upset about losing his condo. It's just a condo. He may have offered, but he didn't quite expect Jeff to be accepting of his offer. His phone vibrates again; Annie offers to talk to him. Abed declines. In this case, Britta might be the better option to talk some sense into Jeff. 

 

Jeff is looking at Abed, "- Lucky charms?" He offers, attempting to bridge the gap between frustration and clarity. 

 

 "How are you so satisfied all the time? Don't you ever want anything more out of life than cereal?" Jeff's like the kids on the playground who used to be mean to Abed for being weird, when he'd only been trying to help. 

 

 "Sometimes I like to pour hot cocoa mix into cold milk and drink like it like a cold hot chocolate." Abed tries to respond appropriately, "I call it "special drink." There's nothing wrong with liking simple things such as cereal. In fact, between a condo and a bowl of cereal, he'd take the cereal. There's direct enjoyment from eating it. No one can take it from you. 

 

"And some day you will know it by its true name, diabetes." 

 

There's little that angers Abed nowadays. Jeff should be more like him. He tries to convinced Jeff of that, and it works. Jeff sits down. Abed checks his watch again. He promised he'd go shopping with Annie and Troy, acting as a buffer between the two of them, so it wouldn't be so hard for Annie. He leaves Jeff on his couch, grabs a jacket and sets off to meet Annie. 

 

"Abed!" she runs up to him, "Thank you for coming. I couldn't face Troy talking about his date." 

 

He thinks about that for a while. Maybe helping friends get dates while being in love with them is something you're supposed to do. Although Jeff and Britta haven't made in progress in that area. So far they're intent on teasing the other about everyone they date. Jeff even went as far as to split up Britta and Vaughn, accidentally. 

 

She's looking up at him, her cheeks rosy and eyes bright from nerves. There's something else entirely in her expression. "Are you going to be okay?" He asks. 

 

"Me? I'll be fine." 

 

"How's your landlord?" He remembers her news. Surprised, she has to think about it. 

 

"He's doing well. Recovering." That's good to hear. Abed wants to offer that she can come live in the dorms with him. Anything to get her out of that bad neighbourhood. There wouldn't be enough space with Jeff around. 

 

"Good. You know, you should move." 

 

It's as Annie's replying that Troy turns up, looking happy to see Abed. It's been a while since they've hung out. Annie shows them the list of items she made, including color coding of various 'genres' of food. Walking around the isles, she asks about Jeff living with Abed. 

 

"It's getting better." He says honestly, before he left Jeff seemed calmer. A relaxed Jeff is good, he's manageable. 

 

"Good! First set of food is savoury. Sub-section, crisps." Troy goes to grab a basket. 

 

"I don't understand. You like Troy, yet you're helping him?" Abed finally says. 

 

Annie stares down at her colour coded list of food items, "I want him to be happy. And honestly, I want him to like me." 

 

"He does." How could anyone to like Annie? She's willing to let her crush be happy with someone else. Abed hasn't had a crush before, but he'd certainly not want to do this for them. Surely being in love means wanting them to be with you? 

 

"Maybe." Annie pushes her hair from her face. It's hanging loose today, rather than pinned at the top. "Not in the right way." 

 

It's true, Troy hasn't mentioned Annie or having a crush on her. He tells Abed about a lot of girls he finds attractive. If he likes her, he should have said something. "He'd give her up if he thought you needed him. He's attracted to her, nothing else. That's not the right way." His voice is soft, and Annie turns away, crumbling the list in her hands. 

 

 Annie sniffs, "I want to believe you." 

 

Troy glides back in, and Abed steps away from Annie, so they're not so close. He doesn't look at her as she unrolls her list of food and starts walking away. He follows, always keeping a step behind. 

 

++++ 

 

"You're really nice." Troy tells Annie, after she's set up his little table and told him how to make a girl happy on a date. "We should've hung out more in high school." 

 

Annie feels like she's been hit in the face with a rock. Everything hurts. Troy had years to realise that, and instead he spend them ignoring her until he was a loser like Greendale.

 

"Remember when you pretended to be my backpack?" She says, and tries to go on to say about how she would have liked that friend in high school. Would have killed for Troy to have noticed her and joked around like they'd known each other for years. 

 

She thinks back to what Abed said, about how Troy would give up his date for Annie. If she told him how she felt, would he give up Randi for her? As her friend, if nothing else. She knows how much Troy likes his girl. 

 

"I gotta go get ready." Troy says, getting to his feet. She wants to stop him. 

 

Troy, wait! I have to tell you." Her mouth dries and her throat swells shut from nerves. This is it. The moment she's been picturing. Not exactly the setting or circumstances she wants (she'd imagined on prom night, or in the canteen, or at some party that Troy would declare his forbidden love to Annie). He turns to look at her and panics. 

 

"My appendix is bursting." She finally splutters. That's a terrible excuse. She's be crying right now, or screaming out in agony. 

 

"What?" Troy's eyes bulge in confusion. 

 

Annie clutches her stomach, "Yeah. Yeah. My appendix is bursting." She screams out in pain, trying to make it believable. Immediately, she regrets this decision. Now is not a time she can change her mind. 

 

"Oh. Oh no." Troy rushes forward and helps Annie to her feet. "i can take you to the hospital? Is it bad?" 

 

She nods. "Really, really pain." 

 

Troy checks the time on his phone, "Can you wait three hours until after my date?" 

 

Annie screams again, doubling over in fake pain. This is no different from Troy faking an injury to get out of playing football, isn't it? If he knew why she was pretending, he'd get it. 

 

He drives her to the hospital, borrowing a car from the Greendale drivers' ed class. They have three dying vehicles and insurance that's through the roof after they let Greendale students 'borrow' the cars for any reason. Annie sends a quick text to Abed. 

 

I FREAKED OUT AND AM NOW FAKING AN ILLNESS TO STOP TROY GOING OUT WITH RANDI. HELP???? Xx

 

ARE YOU OKAY? Comes Abed's quick response. 

 

ASIDE FROM THE SITUATIONAL FACTORS, I'M FINE. PLEASE HELP. 

 

Annie sees Troy glancing in her direction and she frowns, clenching her stomach. "Just googling symptoms of appendicitis. I definitely have it." 

 

YOU'RE IN TOO DEEP, GOVERNOR. KEEP YOUR COVER. 

 

Annie slides her phone back into her pocket, and tries not to cry.

 

++++

 

The awkward conversation with the nurse stretches into five minutes. She explains she faked the pain to stop the love of her life getting together with another girl.  Pleading for him to release her from hospital doesn't work, and eventually she asks for a drink of water. When she steps out the room to get one, she makes a run for it. 

 

There are plenty of taxis outside the hospital, and the man doesn't seem to notice her attire. No comment is made about it. She's left her phone, keys and money in her bag and jumps out of the taxi the second she arrives on campus, taking note of the company so she can pay them for the journey at another time. The East lawn is packed with students, and she realises too late what she's wearing. 

 

After a minute of searching, she finds Troy and the girl, Randi. Who is as gorgeous and stunning as Annie imagined she would be. He's just putting his coat around her. Like she told him to if he liked the girl. 

 

"No!" she yells, and then stops herself. Troy is her friend, he almost missed meeting a girl he clearly liked for her. Abed was right. The way Troy likes Annie is far superior to the way he liked Randi. As his friend, she should support him, no matter what he own feelings are. Troy doesn't feel the same way. 

 

"Before you two proceed, I have one thing to say..." I'm sorry would be a good start. She wants to tell him the truth, but it's too unfair. It would ruin Troy's first college date with a grown up college girl. It takes her a while to force herself not to tell him to stop and be with her. 

 

"I want my nana's blanket back." The words come out all wrong. That wasn't what she wanted to say. As Abed would tell her once again, she's in too deep. So she scoots the two of them over and takes the blanket from them, wrapping it around her arms. "Thank you. Have a nice date." That's as close as she can get for now. It's huge for her. 

 

Shirley is right there watching this unfold, and is so nice she struggles not to cry. It's so good to have friends here and that was really hard for her. They start heading for the car park, presumably towards Shirley's car to take her home. It might be the gown or the emotional state she's in, but the idea of going back to her apartment at this time of the night scares her. For the last week, she's been keeping a hammer by her bed and pepper spray in her pyjama pocket. She's woken up every hour, when she hears a noise outside.

 

The last thing she wants to be tonight is alone. 

 

"You know, I think I'll go see Abed." She decides, hugging Shirley goodbye and thanking her. She sets off towards the dorms. 

 

+++ 

 

Abed enjoys hearing the music, confused at the lyrics. Wrapped up in the Jeff situation, he must have missed what was happening in the group's lives. He'll get Annie to catch him up. 

 

Britta and Jeff are outside and he joins them, sitting on the stairs next to Jeff. 

 

"You looked like you moved out." he observes, hoping he managed to pull off the disappointed tone of voice. 

 

"I checked into a motel and I'm looking for apartments." He explains, "You would've been fine with me staying forever?"

 

"Yup." He lies. He would have let him stay forever. 

 

"You're pretty cool, Abed." It's nice to hear a genuine compliment from Jeff. When he hugs him, he winks at Britta to say thanks for helping him. 

 

The music is pretty repetitive after that, and Abed decides to head back to his dorm for an early night. Or to watch a movie. It'll let Britta and Jeff have a chance to talk things out and have some alone time they both desperately want. He's surprised to see Annie, sat down by the frame of his door in a hospital gown and a pink blanket draped over her. She looks up at him. 

 

"Troy's on his date." She sniffs, wiping her eyes with the corner of the blanket. 

 

Abed knows that, he saw the two of them together, "Jeff moved out." 

 

"Can I please stay here tonight?" Annie asks, and Abed helps her to her feet and opens the door for her, welcoming her inside. 

Abed sits at the front of the class room today, next to Annie. She's easy to spot in a bright yellow cardigan. Sitting next to Jeff has gotten a little slow recently, since all he does is text and copy Abed's notes. He thought Jeff would be the source of adventures, but maybe that's only when they're collectively in a group. Annie passes him a note during the lesson, asking if he's going to the 'night under the stars'. He didn't plan on going and shakes his head. 'Why?' he mouths. She scribes another note. She was going to ask the group to go. Abed wouldn't mind going as a group.

Chang wakes Jeff up from a nap loudly and dismisses class. He walks out pretty quickly, thinking of the group. Lately, things have slowed down. He's busy making films to hang out with Troy too much, there's no more 'will they, won't they' with Jeff and Britta, it doesn't look like Annie and Troy will work things out. Maybe they need a new thing. Like starting a new hobby together. There's a great place down town where you can get any pet you can think of. Legal or not. A side kick snake. 

The study room is empty so Abed sits down. He starting making a fortune teller in class, writing their names on the very inside. For eight slots, he had to add Chang. He then writes situations on each of the inner folds- fights, kisses, starts a band, shares plots- and finally writes times on the outside. Tomorrow, next week, in the future. He starts playing with it, pushing his fingers in and out. He knows where each of the people are. 

Tomorrow. Fights. Jeff and Britta. 

Next month. Starts a band. Annie and Shirley. 

Next week. Kisses. Troy and Annie. 

The problem with the fortune teller is that Abed knows who's who and can pick and choose the outcomes. And the outcomes are limited. Britta walks in and Abed holds out the fortune teller to her. "Pick one." He holds out the origami to her and she shrugs. 

"I don't know, Abed." She pats his shoulders, "Let's just study, 'kay?" 

He goes back to playing with his fortune teller until Annie walks in. She looks upset, her lip stuck out and eyes cast down to the floor. Both thumbs are pressed against either strap of her bag, which she only does when she's excited or sad. 

"Abed, can I talk to you?" Annie asks. 

He nods, "Sure." There's a pause and Annie raises her eyebrows sternly at him. "Oh, you mean outside. Sure." 

Annie drags him by his wrist out to the library, "Um, Abed? Do you know a girl called Randi?" The yellow colour of her cardigan hurts his eyes to state at. Her lip gloss has been applied recently, her mouth shiny and pink. 

Randi, Troy's mentioned copying homework from a girl called Randi. "Black hair? Tall?" 

"Is she cute?" Annie asks suddenly. Abed opens his mouth to speak, hesitating. She's definitely hot. Curvy legs, nice breasts, shiny hair. Not that Annie would like to hear that. 

"No." He lies. Annie smiles at him.

"Okay." She sighs, "Is she nice?" Annie plays with the ends of her hair, pushing locks around her fingers and gently rocking back on her feet. 

"I'm not sure. Is this to do with Troy?" 

She folds her arms. Part of Abed wishes he'd not said it immediately, the rest of him wishes seconds later when she starts to cry. He holds out his hands in a stop gesture, "Please don't be upset. I'm sorry!" She blinks a few times and tries not to cry. 

"I just...don't know what to do! Do I give up? I really, really like him, Abed. I've liked him for years." She gets a tissue from her bag and dries her eyes, "I'm sorry. You don't need this. It's just been a long morning. My landlord got shot again and the heater broke in my flat, there's ice on the inside of the walls." She starts to get weepy again so Abed just nods and tries to look sad too. Show sympathy. She hugs him, pressing her cheek against his shoulder. 

When he had a breakdown as a kid, his Mother would stroke his hair and make calm shushing noises. Sometimes she'd sing him a song. He doesn't know any songs Annie would like that he knows, but he strokes her hair, "It's okay. It'll be okay." 

She steps back, wiping her eyes. "Thanks." She says quietly. 

"As far as Troy goes, I recommend asking Shirley. For your apartment, buy an extra lock for the door and I know a caretaker on campus who would do anything for twenty bucks. He'll fix your heater." 

As he's saying this, Shirley and Britta come running towards the study room. They spot the two of them standing by the door and beckon them inside. They follow and Britta announces that they have news.

"What is it?" Troy asks, looking bored already.

Britta checks the coast is clear, "Jeff is living in his car."

That's not the intense, action thrilled plot line Abed was hoping for, but it's a start. The opening scene before the intro song so to say. The group start to all collapse into conversation, talking over each other about this situation. Turns out Britta and Shirley caught Jeff brushing his teeth and showering on campus. Technically Abed showers and brushes his teeth on campus too. 

They calm down, agreeing to calmly discuss the matter with Jeff when he arrives-late as per usual- so to not upset him or damage his fragile ego. 

After five minutes Annie announces she's going to start doing work, "How can he live on campus and still be late?" 

Pierce starts telling a story and living in his car and AIDS and then Britta's hippie ex-boyfriend which doesn't interest Abed at all. He start playing with paper again, glancing up only to see if Annie seems okay. She seem better now. When Jeff walks in, she doesn't even look up until Shirley yells that he's living in his car. Living in a car sounds cool. No bills. No mail. Less space to tidy up. The only down side is parking fees. And Abed can't drive. 

"Stay with me." he offers, "My room has a bunk bed, which is a misnomer because it's the real deal." It's not as though Jeff would be the first of the group to stay over at his house. Annie has slept there. He starts heading off to his dorm room to do some studying, maybe watch a movie when Annie chases after him, catching him up. 

"I'm going to talk to Shirley, but I wanted to say thanks for being a good friend." Abed nods, happy to be good at something. Having friends is new to him, he wants to get it right because these people are people he wants to be in his life for a long time. 

When he's back at his dorm for barely an hour when there's a knock on the door, he gets up to see a beaten Jeff Winger standing there. "Can I live with you?"

He doesn't even need to think about it. Helping friends is what friends do. "Yeah." 

*******

After Annie explains the situation fully to Shirley, there's a lot of hugs and 'bless you, child' that makes Annie feel about seven again. However, she does feel better for getting it all off her chest. Shirley knew a lot of what was going on, but she listens intently to every word Annie says, responding appropriately and nicely. 

"You realise you cannot help this boy plan his date." Shirley advises her, they've moved to the canteen and ordered coffee. Annie cups her between his fingers, stirring it slowly. 

"I know. But it's Troy. I want him to be happy." 

"Screw happy, you should want him to be yours." Shirley nods viciously, and Annie can imagine her giving the same speech to her boys when they get their first crushes. "He's not the brightest cookie in the jar, you've got to tell him how you feel." 

"Oh." Annie's chest hurts. She can't be having a heart attack. The idea of telling Troy after so long freaks her out. If he rejects her, she has to see him every day knowing he doesn't feel the same way. If he likes her. She doesn't know what she'd do. When she thinks of Troy, she imagines him telling her how he's always loved her. How he did notice her in high school. It doesn't get any further than that. She's only ever had one boyfriend, and it was nothing special. A couple of dates and the it one night that made Annie determined never to date a boy unless that boy is Troy. Troy Barnes would not cry during sex. 

"Yeah." Annie tries to sound positive. "I can tell him." Even she knows she's lying. There's no way she can tell Troy how she feels. It's not just the high school thing, it's that he's so fiercely confident. Compared to Troy, Annie is the same shy nerd as she was last year. He pushes time back, rewinds her clock. Little Annie Aderall; outcast in high school. Those words that taunted her through the last few month of school are difficult to forget. They were true. Even the outcasts didn't let Annie sit with them. She was too weird. Too ugly. Too Annie. 

She leaves Shirley to get to class, mindlessly sitting through her class and taping the lecture rather than listening.

++ 

"Hey, Edison." Anita Jones had tapped her shoulder in the class, "How much of you is even real?" 

"W-what?" Annie stuttered, looking up from her books. She clenches the book between her fingers, and the edges slice into her skin, leaving red marks. 

Anita shrugs, her long hair fluttering around her heart-shaped face. She's at least a foot taller than Annie, and much prettier. "Well, most of you is held together by metal. Are you, like, a robot?" She giggles. "Kidding, Edison. Don't look so sad. I'm just teasing." 

Annie smiles meekly through her braces, which probably looks more like a grimace. 

"Never mind. You can't get upset if you're not a real girl!" The group of girls around her start to laugh. That was how the rumour of plastic surgery started. Apparently Annie wore a back brace and the 'braces' were to keep her jaw together after a blotched plastic surgery operation. No one at school, not even the teachers thought this wasn't true. A popular girl's whisper is gospel. 

++

Annie blinks away her thoughts, slowing returning to the lecture where she should be. A robot. It suits her, she thinks bitterly. After all, she's only ever loved one boy and maybe not even then. Can you really love someone you don't know? Since she's become Troy's friend, has her crush lessened or gotten worse? She doesn't know how she feels, except she knows she doesn't want him to go on a date with another girl. Helping him plan a date for another girl feels wrong. 

Greendale doesn't offer her a lot of opportunities, but finding out if Troy is worth her feelings is one of them. 

****

Abed gets bored of Jeff whining after three minutes. It's like having his Father around again. Telling him to turn the TV down, complaining about the size/smell/pathetic nature of the room and walking in front of the TV.

 

He texts Annie the next morning. HELP ME. There's no way he can live with Jeff around. It's nice to have the company, but unless Jeff can relax and enjoy this, it's not going to work. His phone vibrates and he checks it, watching Jeff pace across his living room looking for a number to get some quick cash. 

 

KNOCK KNOCK. XX Is her response. 

 

WHO'S THERE? 

 

JEFF! :D DON'T ANSWER THE DOOR! XX

 

He smiles, despite the awkward position he's been put in by having to comfort Jeff in a moment of loss. To be honest, he doesn't get why his friend is upset about losing his condo. It's just a condo. He may have offered, but he didn't quite expect Jeff to be accepting of his offer. His phone vibrates again; Annie offers to talk to him. Abed declines. In this case, Britta might be the better option to talk some sense into Jeff. 

 

Jeff is looking at Abed, "\- Lucky charms?" He offers, attempting to bridge the gap between frustration and clarity.   


 "How are you so satisfied all the time? Don't you ever want anything more out of life than cereal?" Jeff's like the kids on the playground who used to be mean to Abed for being weird, when he'd only been trying to help. 

  
 "Sometimes I like to pour hot cocoa mix into cold milk and drink like it like a cold hot chocolate." Abed tries to respond appropriately, " I call it "special drink." There's nothing wrong with liking simple things such as cereal. In fact, between a condo and a bowl of cereal, he'd take the cereal. There's direct enjoyment from eating it. No one can take it from you.    


"And some day you will know it by its true name, diabetes." 

There's little that angers Abed nowadays. Jeff should be more like him. He tries to convinced Jeff of that, and it works. Jeff sits down. Abed checks his watch again. He promised he'd go shopping with Annie and Troy, acting as a buffer between the two of them, so it wouldn't be so hard for Annie. He leaves Jeff on his couch, grabs a jacket and sets off to meet Annie. 

"Abed!" she runs up to him, "Thank you for coming. I couldn't face Troy talking about his date." 

 

He thinks about that for a while. Maybe helping friends get dates while being in love with them is something you're supposed to do. Although Jeff and Britta haven't made in progress in that area. So far they're intent on teasing the other about everyone they date. Jeff even went as far as to split up Britta and Vaughn, accidentally. 

 

She's looking up at him, her cheeks rosy and eyes bright from nerves. There's something else entirely in her expression. "Are you going to be okay?" He asks. 

 

"Me? I'll be fine." 

 

"How's your landlord?" He remembers her news. Surprised, she has to think about it. 

 

"He's doing well. Recovering." That's good to hear. Abed wants to offer that she can come live in the dorms with him. Anything to get her out of that bad neighbourhood. There wouldn't be enough space with Jeff around. 

 

"Good. You know, you should move." 

 

It's as Annie's replying that Troy turns up, looking happy to see Abed. It's been a while since they've hung out. Annie shows them the list of items she made, including color coding of various 'genres' of food. Walking around the isles, she asks about Jeff living with Abed. 

 

"It's getting better." He says honestly, before he left Jeff seemed calmer. A relaxed Jeff is good, he's manageable. 

 

"Good! First set of food is savoury. Sub-section, crisps." Troy goes to grab a basket. 

 

"I don't understand. You like Troy, yet you're helping him?" Abed finally says. 

 

Annie stares down at her colour coded list of food items, "I want him to be happy. And honestly, I want him to like me." 

 

"He does." How could anyone to like Annie? She's willing to let her crush be happy with someone else. Abed hasn't had a crush before, but he'd certainly not want to do this for them. Surely being in love means wanting them to be with you? 

 

"Maybe." Annie pushes her hair from her face. It's hanging loose today, rather than pinned at the top. "Not in the right way." 

 

It's true, Troy hasn't mentioned Annie or having a crush on her. He tells Abed about a lot of girls he finds attractive. If he likes her, he should have said something. "He'd give her up if he thought you needed him. He's attracted to her, nothing else. That's not the right way." His voice is soft, and Annie turns away, crumbling the list in her hands. 

 

 Annie sniffs, "I want to believe you." 

 

Troy glides back in, and Abed steps away from Annie, so they're not so close. He doesn't look at her as she unrolls her list of food and starts walking away. He follows, always keeping a step behind. 

 

++++ 

 

"You're really nice." Troy tells Annie, after she's set up his little table and told him how to make a girl happy on a date. "We should've hung out more in high school." 

 

Annie feels like she's been hit in the face with a rock. Everything hurts. Troy had years to realise that, and instead he spend them ignoring her until he was a loser like Greendale.

 

"Remember when you pretended to be my backpack?" She says, and tries to go on to say about how she would have liked that friend in high school. Would have killed for Troy to have noticed her and joked around like they'd known each other for years. 

 

She thinks back to what Abed said, about how Troy would give up his date for Annie. If she told him how she felt, would he give up Randi for her? As her friend, if nothing else. She knows how much Troy likes his girl. 

 

"I gotta go get ready." Troy says, getting to his feet. She wants to stop him. 

 

Troy, wait! I have to tell you." Her mouth dries and her throat swells shut from nerves. This is it. The moment she's been picturing. Not exactly the setting or circumstances she wants (she'd imagined on prom night, or in the canteen, or at some party that Troy would declare his forbidden love to Annie). He turns to look at her and panics. 

 

"My appendix is bursting." She finally splutters. That's a terrible excuse. She's be crying right now, or screaming out in agony. 

 

"What?" Troy's eyes bulge in confusion. 

 

Annie clutches her stomach, "Yeah. Yeah. My appendix is bursting." She screams out in pain, trying to make it believable. Immediately, she regrets this decision. Now is not a time she can change her mind. 

 

"Oh. Oh no." Troy rushes forward and helps Annie to her feet. "i can take you to the hospital? Is it bad?" 

 

She nods. "Really, really pain." 

 

Troy checks the time on his phone, "Can you wait three hours until after my date?" 

 

Annie screams again, doubling over in fake pain. This is no different from Troy faking an injury to get out of playing football, isn't it? If he knew why she was pretending, he'd get it. 

 

He drives her to the hospital, borrowing a car from the Greendale drivers' ed class. They have three dying vehicles and insurance that's through the roof after they let Greendale students 'borrow' the cars for any reason. Annie sends a quick text to Abed. 

 

I FREAKED OUT AND AM NOW FAKING AN ILLNESS TO STOP TROY GOING OUT WITH RANDI. HELP???? Xx

 

ARE YOU OKAY? Comes Abed's quick response. 

 

ASIDE FROM THE SITUATIONAL FACTORS, I'M FINE. PLEASE HELP. 

 

Annie sees Troy glancing in her direction and she frowns, clenching her stomach. "Just googling symptoms of appendicitis. I definitely have it." 

 

YOU'RE IN TOO DEEP, GOVERNOR. KEEP YOUR COVER. 

 

Annie slides her phone back into her pocket, and tries not to cry.

 

++++

 

The awkward conversation with the nurse stretches into five minutes. She explains she faked the pain to stop the love of her life getting together with another girl.  Pleading for him to release her from hospital doesn't work, and eventually she asks for a drink of water. When she steps out the room to get one, she makes a run for it. 

 

There are plenty of taxis outside the hospital, and the man doesn't seem to notice her attire. No comment is made about it. She's left her phone, keys and money in her bag and jumps out of the taxi the second she arrives on campus, taking note of the company so she can pay them for the journey at another time. The East lawn is packed with students, and she realises too late what she's wearing. 

 

After a minute of searching, she finds Troy and the girl, Randi. Who is as gorgeous and stunning as Annie imagined she would be. He's just putting his coat around her. Like she told him to if he liked the girl. 

 

"No!" she yells, and then stops herself. Troy is her friend, he almost missed meeting a girl he clearly liked for her. Abed was right. The way Troy likes Annie is far superior to the way he liked Randi. As his friend, she should support him, no matter what he own feelings are. Troy doesn't feel the same way. 

 

"Before you two proceed, I have one thing to say..." I'm sorry would be a good start. She wants to tell him the truth, but it's too unfair. It would ruin Troy's first college date with a grown up college girl. It takes her a while to force herself not to tell him to stop and be with her. 

 

"I want my nana's blanket back." The words come out all wrong. That wasn't what she wanted to say. As Abed would tell her once again, she's in too deep. So she scoots the two of them over and takes the blanket from them, wrapping it around her arms. "Thank you. Have a nice date." That's as close as she can get for now. It's huge for her. 

 

Shirley is right there watching this unfold, and is so nice she struggles not to cry. It's so good to have friends here and that was really hard for her. They start heading for the car park, presumably towards Shirley's car to take her home. It might be the gown or the emotional state she's in, but the idea of going back to her apartment at this time of the night scares her. For the last week, she's been keeping a hammer by her bed and pepper spray in her pyjama pocket. She's woken up every hour, when she hears a noise outside.

 

The last thing she wants to be tonight is alone. 

 

"You know, I think I'll go see Abed." She decides, hugging Shirley goodbye and thanking her. She sets off towards the dorms. 

 

+++ 

 

Abed enjoys hearing the music, confused at the lyrics. Wrapped up in the Jeff situation, he must have missed what was happening in the group's lives. He'll get Annie to catch him up. 

 

Britta and Jeff are outside and he joins them, sitting on the stairs next to Jeff. 

 

"You looked like you moved out." he observes, hoping he managed to pull off the disappointed tone of voice. 

 

"I checked into a motel and I'm looking for apartments." He explains, "You would've been fine with me staying forever?"

 

"Yup." He lies. He would have let him stay forever. 

 

"You're pretty cool, Abed." It's nice to hear a genuine compliment from Jeff. When he hugs him, he winks at Britta to say thanks for helping him. 

 

The music is pretty repetitive after that, and Abed decides to head back to his dorm for an early night. Or to watch a movie. It'll let Britta and Jeff have a chance to talk things out and have some alone time they both desperately want. He's surprised to see Annie, sat down by the frame of his door in a hospital gown and a pink blanket draped over her. She looks up at him. 

 

"Troy's on his date." She sniffs, wiping her eyes with the corner of the blanket. 

 

Abed knows that, he saw the two of them together, "Jeff moved out." 

 

"Can I please stay here tonight?" Annie asks, and Abed helps her to her feet and opens the door for her, welcoming her inside. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter spoilers: Abed doesn't get an early night and some realisation of feelings occur. 
> 
> Thanks for your ongoing support! <3


	9. Debate 109

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abed hates having feelings. Annie thinks man is evil. There's some unexpected kissing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta'd by the wonderful Jade (find her at parrksandrec.tumblr.com). Longest chapter so far, enjoy!

Annie sits quietly on the sofa while Abed fetches her some clothes to wear. He hands her an old, faded pair of pyjama pants and a familiar lilac shirt with dots on the front. The top that she'd wore before to iron her clothes in. Annie doesn't mentioned it, just thanks him. Perhaps she doesn't remember. He just thought the shirt really suited her last time. She looked so different in it. 

 

She hides behind his wardrobe door and Abed looks away, tidying up the room as quickly as possible. When Jeff lived there, things seemed to get packed away more frequently. Abed usually doesn't tidy until it's necessary. One of the beds has stripped bare, so he grabs some of his nicer spare sheets from the draw and starts putting them on the bed. Annie takes a pillow case from him when she's done changing, and helps him out. She's pulled her hair down, so it's loose around her face. She looks nice, softer somehow. It suits her. 

 

"Are.." he hesitates, "Are you okay, Annie?" Troy's on his date right now. That's got to be a bad sign. 

 

"I don't know. I'm tired." She looks up at him, "Promise you won't tell anyone I'm telling you this?" 

 

She sits down on the sofa and hugs the pillow to her chest as comfort. "Of course not." He promises. 

 

Nervously she tucks her hair behind her ears. She seems so mature at Greendale, organising the group and seemingly the calm, sane one. Looking at her now, she seems more reserved and as she was expected to be; a teenager coping with a heartbreak. "I thought I liked Troy. I did. Now I get to see him everyday to help him with his work, support him and talk to him like a normal person. You were right, he was willing to give up his date to make sure I was okay. He put me first." 

 

Abed listens carefully, trying to think of something he can say to make this better. Anything that might comfort her in this time of need. She carries on, tears running down her cheeks. 

 

"I like this me. The more grown up, confident version of me who can cope with Greendale without drugs or crying herself to sleep. High school sucked so badly for me,and I never want to feel that way again. But I don't feel like me some of the time. I don't have my family or my home any more. I can't see myself, this doesn't feel like me and I'm so so scared if I stop loving Troy there won't be anything left of me." 

 

"Annie, Annie," Abed says, putting his hands on either side of her face so she'll look at him. His thumbs brush the tears from her face and he stops her talking, "You are you. Change does not make a new person. You're just different and that's okay." He wishes it wasn't up to him to comfort her. He wants her to see that who she is, isn't who she loves or who loves her. "Everything that makes you you is here. You're nice, and clever and a great friend. That's Annie. You won't loose yourself if you stop loving Troy." 

 

She smiles, more tears falling and he just hopes he had made sense, "I like Annie. This Annie." He holds his index finger up, and presses it to hers, the one her used to make a blood pact with her. "Friends, no matter what." 

 

+++++ 

 

Annie wakes up to the smell of strong coffee, and the soft humming of Abed. Still sleepy, she opens her eyes. Abed is a foot away, holding two mugs of coffee. 

 

"Black, no sugar." He holds up one a of the blue mugs that says 'bikini inspector'. "Sorry. Had to borrow one from the kitchen." 

 

Annie sits up with a small smile, pushing her hair to one side, running her fingers through a few tangles. Her top is around her waist and she tugs it down over her hips, pushing the duvet down to the end of the bed so she can sit up. She takes the mug from Abed. The steam from the cups has made him blush. She almost teases him about it; he looks cute. He's clearly wide awake and he's already dressed. 

 

"Thanks, what time is it?" she asks, clearing her dry throat and taking a sip. 

 

He checks the clock, "Seven ten." 

 

"Hmm. This is good." She gestures to the coffee. "Did you sleep well?" Her first lesson is at ten but the group will be meeting at nine to do some studying. Enough of Annie's work is in her locker, and she'll walk home before the lesson to get her backpack. For now, all she needs is a quick shower, hair straighteners and clothes. 

 

"It's from my Dad's restaurant. He likes it. I slept well, did you?" 

 

"Yes thanks." She stands up, feeling exposed in Abed's pyjama pants. She's so grateful he let her stay, and spoke with her last night. There's a lot of new thoughts to process, mostly relating to Troy and her crush on him. The more she goes over it in her head, the less it seems like a good idea. Troy is her friend. Britta and Jeff just manage to be friends with Jeff's crush on her, and it's still weird when the two of them are together. Annie could tell Troy, but the result could be losing the best friends she's had all her life. A relationship between them would be a mess. 

 

They're polar opposites. Where it matters, they might be the same. Everywhere else is two sides of completely different coins. Annie's controlling, strategic, and careful. Troy's impulsive, spontaneous and fun. Dating him would always be a compromise. What they do, where they go. 

 

 

"Mind if I take a shower?" Annie asks. Abed gets her a towel, plus some of his shampoo and body wash. Mint scented. The showers, thankfully, are cubicles and the water is hot. She stays in for a less than five minutes, and puts Abed's pyjamas back on when she's done. The towel wrapped around her head, she walks back to Abed's dorm room. He's not there but he's left the door unlocked for her. 

 

Annie dries her hair, and thinks about last night. After she'd opened up to Abed about Troy, they talked for a while. About her family, how much she misses her Mum and how much her apartment scares her. He offered to let her stay with him, but she couldn't accept. It's too much and she wants to prove herself. Living alone and being independent gives her confidence. To fall back on a friend feels too much like surrendering. 

 

There's a knock on the door, and Abed walks in carrying a pile of various things. Some clothes and hair straighteners, as well as a toothbrush and food. 

 

"I asked around. Alice donated some clothes and hair straighteners. Thought it might help."

 

"Thank you." Annie feels teary again, just that Abed would go to the trouble of making sure she's happy. She has a look at the clothes first, and Abed turns away while she tries them on. A burgundy skirt will fit her, but the shirts are either too small around the chest on too short around her waist. 

 

"I could go ask again?" Abed offers when Annie tells him. 

 

She hesitates, "Could I borrow a shirt from you?" 

 

Abed's fine with this so Annie looks through his clothes. There's a lack of any sort of clothes. She finds a plain white shirt. In her locker, is the Greendale cardigan for debate team she has to wear today. Her partner dropped out yesterday. A teacher had a nervous breakdown in the chemistry labs so now the entire class has stay quarantined for twenty four hours. She plans to ask Jeff to help. He was a lawyer after all, and he must have been good if no one ever noticed he wasn't qualified. 

 

Tucked into her skirt, no one will notice how long the shirt is on her. No one will have ever seen it on Abed, since he doesn't wear plain shirts. Annie plugs in the straighteners and uses the tiny mirror in Abed's room to run it thought her hair. Without heat protection spray for her hair, she doesn't go overboard using them. Just enough to iron out the curls. 

 

"It seems like a lot of effort to go to." he points out, pulling on a shirt. He's wearing a plaid colourful shirt over green tee. It takes a second for him to run a comb over his hair and get dressed. His hair damp from an early morning shower. "It looks lovely curly." 

"Trust me, it didn't. No one liked me when I had frizzy hair." She looks into the mirror, tilting her head so her hair swings around her shoulders. "I like it this way." 

 

"We'd like you if you looked like you did in high school." Abed says, matter-of-factly. 

 

She smiles at him in the mirror, "You say the sweetest things, Abed." 

 

He shrugs, packing books into his bag for college. He hums tunes from Gun and Roses, a band Annie's brother listened to. She wouldn't have thought he'd like listening to music. She sings the words under her breath. 

 

" _You wanna step into my world._ _It's a sociopsychotic state of bliss_." No one will ever accuse Annie of being much of a singer, but he doesn't stop humming. It's been a while since she stayed with someone and it feels nice to wake up in the morning and talk before class. Sometimes, it feels like she's too grown up for college. In a dorm room with Abed singing daft tunes, it feels like the ideal college life. A new experience. 

 

She feels like they're running late but Abed practically lives next to her classrooms. She sits down, finding a small bag of make up among her donated items.  Abed thought of everything. 

 

"Shirley text me, she's going to pick up your bag from the hospital on her way in." He shows her the text. It's great that another problem her friends fixed for her but tonight she's going to make it home. Depending on her friends is not how she wants to live. Even Jeff managed to move out, without having a home. Her neighbourhood isn't too dangerous to live in. Plenty of people live there. There's spaghetti, the man who pees everywhere. He isn't scared of anything. The martial aid store underneath her have stopped letting people crash on her couch.  

 

Annie thankfully has a pair of shoes to wear, because Abed's are five sizes too big. She piles all her borrowed items together,  making a mental note to send a thank you letter to Abed's friends. 

 

"I didn't stop you doing anything important last night, did I?" Annie asks, feeling guilty. 

 

Abed shrugs, "No." 

 

That's something. They chat a bit about classes and teachers. Small talk with him feels abnormal, after their usual conversations. She knows he won't tell anyone about last night or the stuff she tells him. Her secrets are protected. 

 

They head out to class, and someone bumps right into Abed in the corridor, making him stumble backwards. He looks ready to carry on going past, but the tall jerk stops him. He's large- broad shoulders, square jaw and eyes. The fierce looks he gives Abed worries Annie. 

 

"Watch it, dork." He says, and eyes Annie, chuckling to himself, "Got yourself a girlfriend?" 

 

Annie folds her arms, trying her best to look annoyed with the guy. 

 

Abed shakes his head, "This is Annie." As if that excluded her from being his girlfriend or helped the situation. This is making her feel anxious. 

 

The man is about as old as Jeff, and easily twice Annie's size. He continues to mock Abed. "Never thought I'd see you with a girl, Pak-" 

 

Abed stops him with a snide comment, "You missed some grey when you dyed your hair."

Annie threads her arm through Abed's and leads him down the corridor, away from the nasty man. Abed hasn't got a bad cell in his body, he's a complete sweetie. No one should make fun of him. Sure, he's a little different, but so what? Who isn't? In their group of friends they have a pot-head, a Mom with anger issues, a past drug addict, a jock who faked an injury to stop playing football, a homeless lawyer and an old man who thinks he's a teenager. None of them are the same. This isn't eventhe first time she's seen someone mistreat Abed. 

 

"Nice." She says proudly, giving him a high five when they're out of sight. "That was brilliant!" 

 

"People are easy to upset." He brushes off the compliment. 

 

That doesn't seem true. Annie used to see her bullies with their flawless hair and skin and pressed, perfect outfits. She's watch them walk past, idolising the easy way they waltzed by like ballerinas. No amount of  practise could ever give him that same gracefulness. She tucks her hair behind her ears, realising too quickly she doesn't look like anything is wrong. Like she hasn't given up on her long term crush, been kidnapped by the hospital and spent the night at her friend's house because she's too scared to go home.  

 

Appearances aren't everything. 

 

"Not you." She tells him, "You don't seemed phased by anything. I wish I could be more like that." 

 

She doesn't ask why Abed frowns, looking down at her so much more intensely than he's ever looked at anything. It's the same sort of face he makes when he being understanding, or when he's watching his favourite movie. Concentration. With almost affectionate eyes. 

They're not the first ones to arrive at the study room. Britta and Pierce are sat down in silence. Before they join them, Annie stops. "Thank you for letting me stay, Abed. I appropriate it so much." She leans onto tip toes and kisses Abed's cheek, blushing as she does so. Physical actions seem to get through to Abed better than emotional chats. She hopes he knows how it feels to have such a good friend in her life. 

***** 

Abed watches Annie from across the table. He likes that she's wearing his shirt and how when she kissed him, she smelt like his shampoo. When her hair falls across her face, she smiles and tilts her head backwards to get it off. She has the brightest eyes of anyone he's ever met. Blue, blue, blue eyes. The colour of earth's water when you look at it from space. 

He turns the page of his book, having read none of it. 

This morning was better than any morning when Jeff stayed. Better than the mornings he's on his own.  He trails his fingers over the textbook, following the words Annie is staying only by her voice rather than the text. Abed can't concentrate on anything right now. Things around him feel to bright. The light in the corner is florescent and hurts his eyes. 

"I've got class. See you later." Abed gets up quickly, and slides his bag onto his shoulder. Looking at the ground, he walks out. 

He finds himself in the main library, choosing to hide around the corner away from everyone. The corner, where Annie and him first met is free. He sits down, closing his eyes and humming a theme tune to block out the noise from the college. His heart rate is fast. The coffee taste in his mouth is making him feel sick. 

He has two texts from Annie in as many minutes. 

ABED, ARE YOU OKAY? LESSON'S DON'T START FOR ANOTHER HALF HOUR. XX

IF YOU'RE NOT THEN I'M HERE FOR YOU. XX

He shuts off his phone, and gets up, looking for a particular book. It was a book handed to him by his Father a few weeks ago. 'Asperger Syndrome In Adults'. His Father wanted him to see a therapist about his behaviour, and when he refused his Father insisted on proving to Abed that something was wrong with him. 

He left it in the school library after reading it once. He is not sick and there is nothing wrong with him. He's just weird. People don't understand him, not the other way around. 

Last night with Annie, he felt connected. The strings were tangled and some were loose, but the connection between them was there. Knowing he can connect proves he's not sick. He has friends. He loves his parents. Not just because he feels like he has to or because it's normal. His Dad wants to scare him into seeing a therapist just because Abed doesn't want to live his life like his Father. He is not his Father. 

Abed's not stupid, he can understand the resentment from his Father. Moving to LA to chase his dream of going to film school is too close to leaving for his Father and he's scared Abed is too much like his Mother and will leave him too. People are easy to understand. 

It's what makes his films so good. When people are in front of the camera, it's usually so staged. With Abed, he can tell them how to act naturally as he can see what normality is. Behaviour is predictable. He tears a few of the pages out, shredding them in his fingers. People don't need definitions to be who they are. They need acceptance. 

He waits for things to settle into subdued sights and diminished noises. The Dean through the speaker announces it's time for lessons and Abed grabs his things, sliding the book into his bag. 

+++++++ 

"My debate partner dropped out, and we need you to fill in for him at the championship tonight." Annie says, determined to get Jeff to sign up. Debating club has been thrilling so far this year and she's been preparing for this championship too long to drop out now. Her best chance this late in the game is Jeff. As much as it pains her to say it, he's their only hope. 

"Jeffrey, as debate coach, I am offering you an opportunity to spend the night drinking from the cup of life rather than romancing your nether regions in front of the e! channel." Disgusting metaphor. It makes Annie cringe. 

"I mean, who better than a former lawyer to really stick it to those city college snobs and their star debater Simmons?"

Jeff thinks about it for all of a whole second."Mm, pass."

"Greendale needs a win. The best compliment our sports program gets is that our basketball team is really gay, so what's it gonna take? You know, a plum parking space, free meals, a night of companionship if you know what I mean." Once again, Annie is disgusted with her teacher. 

"I'll do it for the parking space. And if you promise not to tell me what you mean." Thank God! Annie jumps up and down with delight and high fives the Dean. She hasn't even tried the 'hopeless please help me act' for convince him. Jeff loves feeling needed. 

"The topic for debate is 'are people inherently good or evil?'" So when do you want to get together to strategize?" Annie asks Jeff after she catches up with him just before study group gets together. She wants to make sure Abed is here, so she can check he's okay. After this morning, he's acting so weirdly. She hopes she hasn't done anything. 

"Annie, I was a lawyer. I was a debater for money. I think I can handle this." Jeff assures her. Unconvinced,  she takes her seat. 

Troy walks in. Annie's surprised to find she feels nothing. No anger that he went on a date or jealous like she thought she would. Just contentment that she has mastered her feelings for him. 

"Where's Abed?" Annie wishes she knew, "I need to talk to him about his films."

Shirley pouts and shudders, "That boy's flat-out prescient. He can read our minds." 

Annie can't believe it. The films are scarily accurate. No one should be able to predict the future. Abed walks in and she gasps. He looks completely fine, overly happy if anything. 

"I know what you're gonna say. You watched my movies on the website." That might not be a guess as much as Annie texting him to ask about it. Annie's character is sweet in his films, it's rather complimentary. 

"I'm a student of human character. I know you guys all so well I can predict your behaviour. Like Shirley. I know you're a sweet, Christian, generous person." 

They both say, "Oh that's nice" at the same time. Weird but not unnatural. Predicting behaviour is what they try and do in psychology. A subject Abed would excel in. When he gets out his laptop, Annie rushes to his side to talk to him. She looks him over. He looks fine. As good as he did earlier. There doesn't appear to be a good reason as to why he didn't reply to her texts. 

As the other watch the film, she squeezes his arm. "You okay?" She mouths and he looks away, nodding. That doesn't seem okay. Honestly, she doesn't care why Troy is crying in the film. Abed can read people so well, and she can't even read him a little. 

Pierce walks in and they all take their seats. It takes Annie a second to realise Jeff is talking at her. She looks away from Abed. "Huh?" 

"What time does this thing start?" Jeff says, checking his phone while he speaks. 

"Five. And I want everyone to there to support us. Please?" 

Everyone agrees- some taking more convincing than others- but Annie mostly cares that Jeff shows up. And she'd feel better knowing Abed was in the audience. When it's time to go, she watches Jeff like a hawk, worrying he'll run off. While doing so, she holds back to walk with Abed. 

"You're acting weird." She points out, not messing around. "Are you okay? I'm worried." 

"Okay." Abed shrugs. She hates it when he does that. He can use full sentences. "Shouldn't you be talking to Jeff about debate?" 

"No." Annie admits, "He doesn't care about this. Why won't you talk to me?" 

Abed keeps walking when she stops, "I am." 

Annie sighs, frustrating that the people in her life either seems to care too little or not enough about her. Abed doesn't want to be truthful and Jeff won't even listen to her for twenty seconds about something so important to her. There's obviously something upsetting Abed. He doesn't need to tell her what it is, just be open that something isn't right so she can offer to help. 

"Thanks for supporting me in this, Abed." She tells him, "I wish you'd let me support you as well." 

+++++ 

"As Golding's Lord of the Flies demonstrates, man, when left to his own devices, will descend into chaos and evil." Thinking about everything has put Annie off her speech. She's forgetting parts she could recite in her sleep. The actions are delayed and her voice is like Abeds most of the time, forced and emotionless. 

Pierce kicked Abed off his seat so he could stretch out his leg. Outside, Abed got one of the giant foam fingers he's always wanted. Usually they're reserved for sport. He can cheer Annie and Jeff on with it. Despite the delivery, Abed think it's an acceptable opening for Greendale. They haven't won a championship in years. 

"-by the end of this debate, I will prove with facts and data that man is inherently good." Simmons finishes his speech. It's not as to the point as Annie's. Holding a door open for someone doesn't make you good. It's a basic act of kindness. Kindness does not always come from good. Often it's pity or a sense of debt. 

Jeff's is typically personal. There's a song and a lot of cheering. It's glamorous, flirtatious, fun, and puts Jeff as the centre of attention. Everything Jeff famously adores. When the judges announces Greendale got a total of eight, Britta swears under her breath and Shirley tuts in disapproval at her language. 

As the changing for Simmons continues, Abed can see how upset Annie is. This is important to her. The basketball jog in, wearing full gear and immediately start to rehearse. The Dean must have double booked the hall again. He explains the mistake and postpones the championship. Part of Abed is glad; this gives Annie and Jeff time to go over their performance and improve for tomorrow. However, it gives Jeff more time to clown around. He doesn't want this to upset Annie or stress her out. Enough has happened to her in the past few days. 

Jeff and Annie exit the stage, Britta starts yelling about the inhumanity of dividing humans into good and evil. Quitting smoking has really made her grouchy. After a second, he leaves Pierce playing with his giant foam hand and runs after Annie to say that he's sorry and that she was really good. He finds her in the corridor, talking quietly with Jeff. The bin has been kicked over. When she looks at him, there are tears in her blue eyes. 

"Annie, are you okay?" 

Her expression hardens and she steps closer to him, "What do you care, Abed? You were right, I will always be Annie. The same loser outcast from school, who's friends won't even talk to her!" She leave Abed standing alone in the corridor, with all the strings connect them frayed and torn. Feeling connecting to people only leads to it hurting when they leave. 

He doesn't have a lot of time before the latest filming of his episode. His crew have a few hours free and his newest film project on 'love and monsters' is due in this week. As the group have started watching these, he needs to be careful about what happens in them. He invented a situation that would never come about to make them feel at ease with the subjects on the films. In this situation, there's an end of the world theme. Annie and Jeff unite as a zombie killing team, and Shirley takes on the werewolves. Since love has to be a theme, Annie and Jeff have a kissing scene. 

None of this would ever happen. The statistical probability of werewolves and zombies taking over Greendale is almost zero. It'll stop the study group worrying Abed can tell the future, while remaining true to his characterisation. He grabs his film from his locker and texts all his actors and actresses to meet him. 

After showing fake-Shirley, who's real name is Emily, how Shirley would run if being chased by a werewolf, they move into the study room. Fake Annie, who Abed thought was really sweet, and great to work with, told Abed weeks ago that she liked fake Jeff. The Annie and Jeff plot was for her mostly. They run the scene through a few times with scripts. 

"I don't want to die here." Delilah (Annie) says, biting on her lip. 

Tom (Jeff) steps closer to her, sticking up his chin, "I won't let that happen, Annie. I'll keep you safe." 

Delilah became Abed's friend a few weeks into college. She was also in Abed's film class,  but dropped out after she realised she wouldn't be in front of the camera. She was the first to be hired to play Annie. Her joyful smile and hair made her perfect for the part. In a perfect world, he would have just filmed the study group. After trying that out, he found out no one liked it. He cut out all the annoyed faces and 'turn the camera off, Abed, got overall a minute of footage and gave up. 

"Do you promise?" Delilah asks, and Jeff presses himself against her, kissing her with as much passion as they decide is realistic. Way too much. 

"Cut." Abed calls. "That's not how they'd kiss." 

"Abed." Delilah complains, cheeks flushed and grinning. 

"Sorry, but it's not. Too wet. Try being more loving in it. Roll camera." He says to himself, pressing record on his video camera. They run the scene again, and while the two and talking, Abed's phone goes off. It's from Annie. 

I NEED TO TALK TO YOU. WHERE ARE YOU? XX 

He doesn't reply. Just slips his phone back into his pocket and stops the camera again. 

"Cut. That was better. But Delilah," he steps next to her and waves Tom away for a second. "You need to be more reserved. You don't know if you want this. It's new, and you're worried about loving someone. You're also scared of being ripped apart by a zombie." 

He leans into the scene, "Can I?" He asks, wanting to show her how to act with Jeff around. She shrugs, smiling at him. He knows this is something silly to focus on, but this film has to be perfectly in character. 

"I don't want to die here." Delilah repeats, hunching her shoulder and creasing her forehead in worry. He runs his hand down her arm, checking to make sure Tom is watching how he does this right. 

He deepens his voice to act as Jeff, "I won't let that happen, Annie. I'll keep you safe." He cups his cheek to her face and prompts her to lean in. Whispering, "Scared, remember. Lean in like you're about to run away." She does it perfectly. 

"Do you promise?" She asks. 

He leans down, meaning to back away but Delilah grabs his arm and pulls him down, locking her lips against his. It's nice, her mouth is soft and her hair is smooth against his hand. Kissing girls is not where Abed is most experience, but he's had some practise. 

"Oh!" he hears and pulls away, opening his eyes. Actual Annie is standing in the doorway, looking horrified. Her eyes are open wide and her mouth is open. She starts to back away, stammering an apology. "Sorry, I- I'll- Abed-oh." 

"Annie." Abed steps back from Delilah to go talk to Annie, "Sorry, we were-" 

Annie's voice is shrill, "Don't worry about it." She walks out before Abed can explain himself. He's almost glad. He wouldn't have been able to explain the kiss, or how he's been acting. Of course Annie had to walk in. He can't help hurting people. He picks his camera from the side and gestures for Delilah and Tom to go again. They don't say anything, to him, and they get it on the next take. Someone, it doesn't feel like an achievement. 

++++

Zimbardo's Stanford prison experiment is a great example of the Lucifer effect, a theory that suggests good people turn evil in a bad situation.  Although it was only carried out on twenty-four students, the inhumane treatment of prisoners by their fellow students shut the programme down in six days. It was meant to run for fourteen. Annie spend last night doing more research into the debate. Teaching Jeff should be easy, but she needs to do his research for him because he won't. 

"So, in the experiment, Stanford students were divided into prisoners and guards. The guards immediately started-" Jeff winces. "What's wrong?" 

"I have this weird pain right above my eyebrow." 

"It's called a stress headache. I got my first one when I was four." She wishes she didn't have to push him so hard. Studying isn't good for Jeff, it worries him. If they could afford to improvise, she'd let him make it up as he goes along. There's too many points to make up for after the first round. They need to make up the points and beat them. They're going to be as good. 

"Go off book, robot debater." 

  
"Oh, my gosh. You're right. Simmons is so good at using his inherent magnetism to sell his points, and here I am, Like a spinster librarian with my hair pulled back." It already feels good to be out of Abed's shirt and clothes. She decides to pull put his hair to be more laid back. It feels good. 

"What do you think?" 

"Yeah." Jeff mutters. Jeff Winger speechless? She must look good. 

Shirley opens the door giggling and calls, "Be careful. Abed thinks you two are gonna kiss." Abed thinks they're going to kiss? What? Since when does Abed think about who Annie or Jeff are kissing? He goes around kissing random girls he didn't even think to tell Annie about. She still can't get her head around yesterday. Abed and her have been so close lately, and he goes and kissing a girl he's never mentioned to Annie. That's uncool, but there was something else bothering her about that kiss, about seeing Abed kiss somebody. 

The girl looked like Annie. He hair was styled with her hair pinned back in the same way Annie wears hers, and she was wearing something very similar to Annie's style. 

Jeff and Annie laugh about the idea of kissing. Annie frowns. Jeff isn't bad looking. He definitely is good looking. She hasn't considered him before. Too busy gazing at Troy. And he's too old for her. It's ridiculous to think of Jeff as anything other than a friend. Right? 

"Um, okay. The- people are inherently evil." He says. 

"Ooh! We could use this Hobbes quote. 'Man is a collection of base animal urges, to act on them and experience sinful pleasure would be morally no different than taking a breath." Annie's pace of words slow down. Jeff has been drooling over Britta since they started at Greendale and he's staring at her like she's pretty and that feels good. Britta had a thing with Vaughn, Troy dated Randi, Abed is making out with random strangers. Why should Annie be the only one who's young and hasn't taken a breath with a guy. 

"You know, maybe we should study alone." Jeff suggests, and Annie agrees. This cannot happen.   
  
"That way we can be more reproductive--productive!" She corrects herself, mortified at the mistake.

Jeff walks out so far the carpet could have caught on fire from friction. He doesn't even care he's left his phone. Annie sits back down at the table, taking deep breaths and trying not to panic. She picks up a piece of paper, and then throws it back down, burying her face into the books and wrapping her arms around her head. Maybe if she cocoons herself in a pile of textbooks she'll never have to deal with her problems. Abed's text her half a dozen times. She doesn't want to hear his side of the story right now. 

++++

At the debate, Abed cheers whenever Annie speaks, giving support. She hasn't answered him all day. Talking about how people are evil feels some how personal, especially when she looks at him. While discussing lying. He didn't lie to her. Nothing was happening between Delilah and him. She apologised for kissing him. She thought it would make Tom jealous. It worked, they're going on a date tomorrow. Abed felt he should be bothered about being used but it was difficult to be mad when it worked out well for her. Delilah was overjoyed. 

Towards the end, when Greendale is so clearly winning, Simmons rips up his cards. it's worrying, and he starts moving towards Annie and Jeff. Abed can predict his friend's behaviour, but he has no idea where this is going. The boy stops his wheelchair and goes flying from his seat. It happens too quickly for Jeff to think, and he catches Simmons in his arms. Abed can only stare in astonishment. 

It's even more astonishing when Annie runs forward, grabbing Jeff and kisses him. Abed feels like his strings are being wrapped around his throat and choking him. He can't breathe. Shirley is slapping his arm. He looks towards her, unable to watch any longer. Everyone is silent. For different reasons to Abed. 

He likes Annie. 

Abed likes Annie. 

Annie doesn't feel the same way. This is how he feels. Why he's felt weird. He likes her. 

Everyone around him gets up and starts cheering, so he does the same. He refuses to look at Jeff or Annie. Instead he concentrates on the good thing; they won. It doesn't feel good. Man is evil. He would have rather Greendale lost than Annie kissing Jeff. 

He makes sure Shirley gets into her car safely, and then spots Annie walking quickly away from the entrance to Greendale. 

"Annie." He calls, not sure where he's going with this. She pauses, and waits for him to join her. "Well done on the win." 

"Thanks." She smiles. 

He needs to explain what she saw, "I was rehearsing a scene with Delilah. She kissed me to make someone jealous. I don't like her. I've been acting weirdly because I didn't want to screw up. I did. I'm sorry." 

Annie tilts her head, "You didn't. I yelled at you and I got mad for no reason. I think I was jealous that you were kissing someone, because right now my romantic love life sucks." 

Abed doesn't point out that she kissed Jeff. He tells himself it was for the championship, nothing else. 

She looks down at the ground for a second, and bites her lip. "That girl you kissed-" she hesitates, "she plays me in your movies, right?" 

In a step, she moves closer to him, demanding an answers by not saying anything. In the cast of light from the street light, he can't make out her expression. 

"Yeah." he swallows his nerves, "She does." She's inches away from him, so close he can feel her breathing. 

"Cool." Annie says, and she kisses his cheek, moving away from him. 

Abed repeats her words as he watches her walk away, "Cool, cool, cool." 

Man might be evil but Annie Edison is good. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Update will be happening soon, if you want to find me you can at annpxrkins.tumblr.com! :) Thanks for all the support.


	10. Environmental Science

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie is too stubborn to move apartments. A sleep-deprived Abed goes on a rat hunt.

Annie Edison. From study group. His friend. 

 

Annie Edison he likes. 

 

Annie Edison who kissed Jeff Winger. His other friend. 

 

Abed hasn't slept right in a week, since he had to watch Jeff locking lips with Annie. It's not like he's jealous. Annie should be able to kiss anyone she wants. Especially as he helped her to see she didn't like Troy any more. Being attracted to strong alpha males is the obvious choice for girls like Annie, who could have anyone they want. He's not mad at Annie for falling for Jeff. If movies have taught him anything, it's that the girl always goes for the leading man. No matter how much of a jerk he is. 

 

He needs a distraction, so he can sleep. He's been avoiding Annie, both in virtual reality and real life, by ignoring his texts and missing study session once or twice. Troy missed it too, instead working on their biology project. They're looking after a rat. Troy hates Fievel but Abed thinks he's cute for an animal. Rats are interesting. Their brains are similar to that of a human in ways and they make squeaking noises. 

He checks the time. 3:56am, technically Monday. His phone vibrates. It's a text from Annie. 

ABED? XX 

He scrolls up. There's five texts from Annie over the last weekend. Tired and missing her, he replies. 

 

HERE. 

 

Seconds later his ringtone goes off; an old mario tune from the games he played as a child. He answers, worried that Annie is awake at this time. She operates on a six to eight hour policy a night. No exceptions. Not even weekends or holidays. 

 

"Hey." She's whispering on the phone. Instantly, he can tell something is wrong. 

 

"Are you okay?" He asks flatly, his heart pounding with fear. 

 

"Yes. No." She sounds like she's crying. He sits up in the top bunk of his bed, having to bend over so his head doesn't bump the wall. He turns the light on, adjusting to the sudden bright light of the room. "I'm scared." She breathes out shakily. 

 

"Annie. What's happening?" 

 

The second hesitation before she answers feels like eternity, "I heard someone scream. I called the cops but there's no one here." 

 

A scream? Her apartment is in a rough area. The occasional bad night is expected, but horrible. He doesn't know how to help with this.

 

"Are your doors locked?" There are bars on her windows, "Do you want me to come over? How long ago did you hear the scream? Did the cops say how long they'd be?" 

 

Annie's voice is calmer when she speaks again, "The doors are locked. I heard screaming an hour ago, and the cops just said they'd investigate. How would you even get here?" 

 

"I'd call a cab. There are twenty-four hour ones." Abed promises, determined to help in some way. If something were to happen to Annie... 

 

"Don't be silly, Abed. It's okay. I just wanted to talk to you." 

 

Abed wants to feel pleased she choose him to call, and not Jeff."It'll be okay. Nothing will happen to you." 

 

"What about the girl who screamed? Should I go out and see if they're okay?" She's breathing slowly into the phone, seeming to be drifting off. She must be so tired, having been up for so long. 

 

No! "Stay inside. It's probably a kid messing around." As calm as Abed sounds, he wouldn't want Annie anywhere near the people who live outside her apartment. 

 

"Abed..." Annie says sleepily, "Are you mad at me?" 

 

So she has noticed. "No." He feels awful. It's not Annie's fault he likes her. Maybe likes her. People tell him he doesn't understand all of the time, this could be a misunderstanding. A lack of separating romantic and platonic feelings. Attraction doesn't equal feelings. 

 

She doesn't talk for a while and Abed assumes she's fallen asleep. He's waiting to hang up the phone. Turning out the light, he settles back into bed, pulling the cover over his chest and setting the phone so it's pressed against his ear. 

 

"Annie?" 

 

"Here." She replies, whispering into phone. "It's clear outside." 

 

"You can't see anything?" 

 

She smiles, he can hear it in her voice, "I can see the stars." 

 

Annie takes astronomy, so it's unsurprising when she stars listening constellations. "Lacerta, Triangulum Australe, Lavo, Tucana." 

 

Abed looks around so he can see the same sky, the same constellations. "You should show me sometime." 

 

"Okay." She promises, "I will." 

 

"Try to sleep, Annie." 

 

She doesn't reply, and Abed doesn't press the end call button. 

He doesn't miss her so much knowing they're looking at the same stars. It's silly, but so is he. So is she. He wishes on the biggest star he can see that Annie stays safe that night. On another, he wishes Annie would move apartments. Stay with him until she can find her own place. He makes a thousand wishes on a thousand stars. On the last one, he wishes they will all come true. 

 

++++ 

 

Annie doesn't fall asleep that night. She waits for Abed to hang up, mapping out constellations in the dark. She keeps the phone pressed to her ear. It's safer when Abed is on the other side. She steadies her breathing so he'll get to sleep and not wait up worrying about her. Worrying is her job. He eventually hangs up, and the stars start to blear in her vision as tears form. 

 

Eventually, she must have fallen asleep because when she wakes up it's starting to get light. She scans the road for police cars or dead bodies and in the dim light of sun rise. She gets up, rubbing yesterday's mascara from her eyelids. She forgot to wash it off. The black smudges cover the purple shades underneath. It's been a while since she got more than six hours of sleep. 

 

She makes coffee and tries to pull herself out of her fuzzy thoughts of last night. She showers quickly, disliking the loud sound of the water running away in the silent apartment. At least if it's quiet, she can hear things happening. Every so often, she thinks she hears footsteps and convinces herself someone is outside the door, or waiting on the other side of the room. 

 

She's dressed by five and makes another cup of coffee, adding extra sugar to wake her up and take away the bitter strong taste. There's not much food in the house. Eating at Greendale is cheaper and reduces the amount of time she has to spend here. The room is still so plain. When she left home, she only took a suitcase and her rucksack. 

 

Sighing, she listens to the answer machine message for the hundredth time. 

 

"Annie. It's-" There's a second of hesitation, "your Mother. Your Dad is worried about you. Call him."There's a few seconds of muffled noises before she hangs up. 

 

The entire message is ten seconds long. It's been weeks since they spoke. She doubts her Mother will ever forgive her for taking drugs. Studying help, she reminds herself. She never knew they were addictive drugs that would cause a nervous breakdown. She misses her family. Misses the comfort of coming home to them and waking up to her brother's musical alarm. 

 

Her Mom hadn't cried the day Annie left for rehab. She'd stood, stone-faced, in the living room. She barley glanced up, until Annie started to cry. _'Be quiet, Annie. You've embarrassed yourself enough as it is.'_

Annie could never bring herself to hate her mother; not even for pushing her into so much. For comparing her to other girls, leaving beauty magazines with pages containing weight loss tips folded over. It hurt to feel like she was never good enough. Second best to every stranger who weighed less than her, or didn't need braces. She'd cover Annie's perfect report scores with pictures of her cousin's beauty pageant. She wanted Annie to be smart and beautiful and when Annie wasn't, she tried to force her into it. 

Her Father never helped when Annie's Mother stopped her eating her favourite snacks, or threw out her favourite sweater because 'it made her look like a Grandma'. Her brother didn't have to watch his weight, or be smart. He just had to marry someone beautiful according to their Mother.

She checks her emails, deleting any spam. A cluttered inbox makes Annie nervous. Then she empties her laundry basket and tidies the spotless kitchen to kill some time. When nothing helps take her mind off things, she calls Abed. It's just after six, and she feels terrible for waking him so early. He answers on the second ring, clearly already awake. Her guilt lessens.

"Morning." Annie says, smiling as he replied. 

"Morning, Annie. Are you okay?" There's a slight sense of urgency in his tone she rarely hears. 

 

She glances towards her reflection in the mirror, and the dark circles around her eyes from the lack of sleep. "Yeah. Are you?" She clears her throat, hoping Abed didn't catch the break in her voice. 

 

"Of course."

 

"Can we go over some Spanish notes this morning? You haven't been to study group and I could catch you up on what we've done. Coffee's on me." 

 

"That would be great." She hopes it's her anxiety making her sense a hesitation in his voice. Abed has barley talked to her all week, and she's not sure why he's mad at her. She suspects it's to do with the girl she caught him kissing. If he's worried she'll tell the group, she can assure him that's not going to happen. She can have a crush on whoever he wants. It's cute really. A director and the actor. Like from a romantic movie Abed definitely wouldn't watch. 

 

"I can meet you at the cafeteria in twenty minutes?" He suggests, and Annie agrees, hanging up. In a minute, she's packed her bag and is locking her apartment. Breathing a sigh of relief at leaving, she hurries towards Greendale. The air is cold in the morning, chilling her fingers. She picks up the pace, looking around her street for any sign something bad happened last night. Nothing. 

 

That's a good thing. Right? No blood in the gutters, no weapons lying around. People often get hurt in street fights, but there's no sign of a struggle. Maybe she imagined the entire event. The lack of sleep and total paranoia could have led to a hallucination. Isn't lying to the cops an offence? She shakes her head, she's not going to get arrested. 

 

The walk to school is faster than usual, and she makes it to the cafeteria before Abed does. She's lucky he lives on campus, and doesn't seem to mind her crazy schedule. The tables are mostly empty, with only a few students sitting eating breakfast. The only worker there looks exhausted, their head resting in their hands. Annie orders two coffees; one black and one with extra sugar and milk. There are some delicious cookies on sale. Ignoring her Mother's scolding her in head, she orders two of those as well. 

 

Sitting back down on the table, she gets out her Spanish books and mumbles words under her breath. Abed walks in and waves. He's wearing a bright plaid shirt she remembers seeing in his drawer and liking. She relaxing, and as he sits down and passes him his coffee and cookie. 

 

"Thank you." He grins, delighted, immediately splitting the cookie in half. She shakes her head. 

 

"I have one." She's been picking at her cookie. It is delicious and she's glad she got it. Hopefully soon, they'll sell Shirley's brownies here. Once she opens her baking business, it would make sense to start on campus. Close to home, and her lessons. 

 

"Sorry to wake you so early." She tucks her hair behind her ears. 

 

He tilts his head, "Which time?" The adds, "Never worry about that." 

 

They fall into a conversation about Abed and Troy's biology project, and her tests coming up. She wishes she'd taken biology, it sounds really interesting. Abed suggests transferring but she wouldn't want to change her classes this late in the year. Her timetable is full already, since she takes additional classes for credit. Psychology experiments take up a lot of time. 

 

"What ever happened with Professor Duncan's psychology experiment?" She assumes he means the one he accidentally ruined. 

 

"He asked me to bring you in for a new experiment." Annie admits, "But I said no." 

 

"Why?" She never thought to mention it to Abed. He's not a social experiment for Professor Duncan to use as a career aid. It was bad enough that Annie asked her friend to wait in a room for twenty four hours, without asking him to come back again. 

 

"I figured you'd rather watch Indian Jones." He must have explained the plot to Annie ten times over and seen it at least that many times. If she doesn't hear from Abed, she guesses he's watching Indiana Jones. She should probably watch it too, but the bugs freak her out. Actions movies were never her favourite. Give her a chick flick and she's cry, give her an action movie and she'll fall asleep. 

 

Her coffee is watery, but keeps her alert. She even steals one of Abed's sugar sachet and adds it to the mix for extra help. Her cookie helps too. As Abed's telling her about a movie he watched recently, she realises she hasn't been worrying about her apartment. It feels good to forget. To be calm. She could easily fall asleep right now, but because she's feeling safe now. 

 

"Abed," Annie tells him when he finishes talking. She takes his hand from across the table. "I want you to know I really appreciate everything. Letting me stay with you, talking to me late at night, meeting me this morning. All of it. I'm so glad to be your friend." 

 

Abed shakes his head, looking down and blushing. She tried to pull her hand away, worried she's made him uncomfortable but he keeps holding on. He weaves their fingers together. It's Annie who's blushing now. She's never held hands with a boy before. Even if that boy is her friend. 

 

She waits for Abed to speak, but he doesn't. In the cafeteria, she can hear a few more people talking around them. Someone is listening to music quietly in the corner. She recognises the song. From a disney movie, she thinks. She had the soundtrack to every disney show ever. She watches Abed's brown eyes fall away from her face and behind her. He draws his hand quickly away from her. 

 

"Hi, Britta." Annie looks around to see Britta standing behind them. She sits down next to Abed and raises her eyebrows at Annie. 

 

"Morning, Abed. Morning, Annie. Studying without us?" She flicks Annie's Spanish book. Actually, they hadn't done any studying in the end. They'd gotten sidetracked. Not that they needed to study, even missing study group, Abed is easily smart enough to deal with Spanish. They don't have to learn a lot. 

 

"Not really." Annie replies, "Just having an early morning catch up." 

 

Abed doesn't say anything. She's less worried he's mad at her now. He seems to have something on his mind. A little more distracted than usual, but not angry. She's relieved. 

 

"I'm going to go get more coffee." Annie gets up, "Do either of you want something?" 

 

"I'd love some coffee." Britta says, as Abed shakes his head, no. 

 

"Okay." She needs more coffee to stay awake. The server is actually asleep on the counter, a notebook open in front of him. There are complex sketches scribbled across the page. As Annie approaches. the guy wakes up and sits up too suddenly, almost toppling off their chair. 

 

"Sorry. Long night?" Annie asks as the barrister rubs his eyes. He must have been here for at least two hours already, and have a long day ahead.

 

"Yeah." He mumbles, "There's no sleep allowed for an astrology major." 

 

Annie looks at him properly. Curly brown hair and dark freckles splashed across his face. "You were in my astrology class!" 

 

"Annie, right?" He pushes his hair from his face, exposing pink cheeks and pale eyes. 

 

"Yes. Uh, Mikaee?" She draws his name from the first introduction classes. They played silly 'name games' to introduce each other, and so the teacher could sit around and not teach. "Why'd you stop taking classes?" 

 

He gestures to his surrounding, "Got a job so I could pay for a real tutor. If you ever want any help in class," he stops mid-sentence to yawn, "Sorry. I'd help you out." 

 

Annie's thankful for the offer, but would never ask for help from someone with this much on his plate, "Thanks, Mikaee." 

 

He shrugs, "So what can I get you?" 

 

"A black coffee and a cappuccino, please." When his back is turned, she tucks a $10 bill into the tip jar. It's more than she can spare, yet Mikaee did something nice for her. By the look of it, he could use some money for coffee as well. 

 

As Annie is handed her drinks, she tears open a sugar packet for Britta. "Boyfriend got a sweet tooth?" 

 

"This is for Britta, the girl with us." Annie asks, stirring the sugar in "And Abed isn't my boyfriend." 

 

Mikaee chuckles, "You hold hands with all your friends?" 

 

Annie ignores him, mostly because her cheeks are flaming too much for her to be taken seriously. Abed, of course, isn't her boyfriend. She's getting over Troy still (although, does she have to get over someone she never dated?) and Abed is her friend.  

 

She watched his last episode starring the group, and saw the Annie and Jeff kissing scene, with Delilah in it. It was played really well, almost perfectly in character. How Abed knew Annie would kiss Jeff is beyond her. The kiss was irrational and crazy, Annie regretted it instantly. She'd only kissed one boy in her life before then. Jeff hasn't mentioned the kiss since. In fact, he's been ever more distant than Abed has been.

 

"See you around." Annie nods goodbye, carrying both coffees back to the table. Britta's face lights up as her hands cup around the hot cup. Shirley has arrived and has taken Annie's seat, so she sits on the nearest table. More people have filtered through an sat down, ready for the morning. 

 

The Dean walks in and starts faffing around with a speaker. Jeff waltzes into the room, and Annie straightens her back, hoping her cheeks are back to the normal colour. Now she's not obsessing over Troy, she can actually see people now. Abed's more attractive than she ever realised; with prominent cheekbones and gorgeous eyes. Jeff's manly and strong, his confidence only adding to that. 

 

Annie stirs her coffee, trying not to think about going home tonight. Her safe bubble has been popped, and now she's facing the reality of the situation. She's scared of going home. Staying with Abed, or even Shirley, is an option. The idea of asking for more help fills her with shame. After a second she considers calling her parents, and that's enough to decide she's going home tonight. Nothing is worse than facing her Mother. She's used to be afraid in her own home. 

 

Annie sighs. Self-pity is not a good look for her. 

 

The screeching of a microphone brings Annie from her thoughts. The group is here now, all listening to the Dean's newest announcement. "Good morning. I'm here to kick off the first day of new tradition of our school called green week!" 

 

Pierce, who Annie hasn't noticed, speaks up, "What? First, we give a month to black history, Now we're blowing seven days on the Irish?" Usually, Annie would try and explain how wrong he is, but she's too tired this morning. Britta is trying to make eye-contact with Annie, obviously going to make a big deal about the hand holding thing. Even so, she ignores Britta for the Dean. 

 

She finds herself laughing as Abed is the loudest to clap when the Dean announces his 'Envirodale '. The clapping quickly dies down, and before Annie can get too excited about Green Day coming to play, Jeff starts a bet on whether they'll turn up. Annie packs her Spanish book into her bag. 

 

Britta catches up to Annie on the walk to Spanish, grabbing her arm to stop her walking away. She frowns , acting confused as to why Britta has stopped her. "Are you and Abed-" 

 

"No. We're friends." Annie whispers, her arm linked with Britta and her face close to hers so no one else can hear. Her hair looks bright today, contrasted by her black outfit. She looks so effortlessly cool. A few steps ahead, Troy is arguing with Abed. Annie listens in for a moment and hears the name of their pet rat. Abed's frustrated Troy isn't putting enough energy into their project. 

 

"Friends don't hold hands." Britta says smugly and Annie tenses her arm around Britta's. 

 

"We link arms. It's no different." They're almost at class. Señor Chang has been an even worse teacher than usual. With study group, Annie is struggling to keep on top of all these extra assignments. "I was upset but I'm okay now." She adds at the end, hoping Britta won't press for any more details. She's too tired to work out an explanations right now. 

 

They fall into class, Annie taking her usual seat next to Abed at the front. 

 

"Since you're all wide awake, I thought we'd begin with a test." Señor Chang announces, enticing a collective groan from the entire class. Even Annie sighs. A test is just her luck. Anything less than 90% might bring her grade down for the class. She doesn't even feel 10% okay today. 

 

She glances at Abed, who was up as late as her. He seems almost unaffected by the late nights. His internal clock (endogenous pacemaker, she corrects) must be used to pulling all nighters during movie marathons and late night studying. Any less than six hours of sleep and she'd be falling asleep during class and slipping into a coma. He gives her a thumbs up, a 'you can do it' cheer. 

 

Señor Chang hands out the tests and Annie immediately starts answering the questions. The first couple are easy, then get increasing worse. With the lack of good teaching, passing Spanish was always going to be difficult but this is too far. Señor Chang is purposefully making it impossible. Determined to pass, Annie keeps reading through the questions, scribbling notes around the side. 

 

She's lost in her work when she notices Señor Chang standing inches above her. She panics,holding her breath and waiting for the screaming to begin. She's carried on writing after they've been told to drop their pencils. Her sleep deprived ears didn't hear him above the test. She raises her hands, but it's too late. Señor Chang tilts her table, and she feels queasy as he drags her outside the class. 

 

"I wasn't-" Señor Chang shuts the door on her. She picks up her bag, forcing herself not to cry and leaves the desk where it is. She's outside when she realises she'll be able to listen in on class. No way is she getting a bad attendance grade because Chang tossed her out. He's setting essays for the class; a new tradition that's making her life hell. When class is over, she's furious and tired and sick of Chang. She storms away from the window, straight to the Dean's office. 

 

"Melissa, tell the Dean he has an appointment." She demands, ready to kick up a fuss. No one is going to tell her that the Dean is busy. Everyone knows his job is sitting around planning ways to destroy the college budget. Melissa is stood by the photocopier, which is churning out bright green posters. 

 

"Okay. Go on it." She shrugs, turning back to photocopying. Annie expected some kind of argument but she walks in, not even knowing. 

 

"Something has to be done about Señor Chang!" She says, startling the Dean. He's at his desk, looking through colour samples. His desk is tidy, but his office is filled with junk. There's a red sofa on one side of his desk, and some chairs on the other. The Greendale flag is pinned to his wall, and the pin board is covered in different letters. Some of which look fairly important. 

 

Without letting him speak, she continues, "He's rude, he sets insane amounts of homework completely unrelated to the course, and he doesn't even speak that much Spanish! He never plans lessons and gives us tests every week. We don't have enough time for this!" 

 

The Dean nods, "Miss Edison, at Greendale we don't employ teachers based on credentials but their personalities and experience." 

 

"Today he dragged me and my desk out the class and yelled at my friends! His temper is awful!" She crosses her arms, "I'm here to make an official report and complaint. It's against health and safety regulations to move furniture with students on it. He could have injured me." 

 

"Did he?" The Dean acts casually. 

 

"Maybe he did." She lies, "How seriously are you going to take my report?" 

 

The Dean sighs, "Señor Chang has been working here for years and in the last three years, we've tried to fire him several times. No one else wants his job. If Señor Chang were to be fired, we'd have to cancel Spanish 101 and all language credit gained through the class would be revoked." 

 

If that happens, the entire group will have to take an extra class next year or their graduation would be pushed back. Shirley hates spending this time away from her boys and Jeff can't wait to leave. Abed is already planning on taking an extra film class next year, once his Dad agrees and won't have time to take another class. She doesn't want all their effort in the class to go to waste. It's not fair. 

 

"So, are you hurt?" The Dean presses, clearing nervous. She lets her arms fall to her side, defeated. 

 

"No." She refuses to take back her report on him though, "We'll deal with this."  

 

They need a lawyer. Luckily for Spanish class, they have the next best thing. 

 

++++ 

 

"What are we going to do?" Shirley asks as the walk into the study room. She paces the room. Troy lies down on the table, staring up at the ceiling. He's taking the extra work okay. Abed takes the sofa next to him, feeling overwhelming tired after staying up last night. Jeff, not registering what they're talking about, sits down at his usual spot at the table. He takes out his phone and starts texting. 

 

Pierce chuckles, "Told you. Asian people shouldn't be allowed to teach." 

 

Shirley turns to face him, "The next words out of your mouth better be helpful." 

 

Troy makes a suggestion, "We could do one of those strikes. Signs, a megaphone." 

 

"We'd only annoy Chang and he'd fail us all." 

 

Annie storms in, "I've already reported him to the dean. He said they've been trying to fire him for three years, But nobody wants his job." He rarely sees Annie his angry. He assumes that wasn't all the Dean told her. 

 

"I can't write a 20-page paper. I got a presentation in my marketing class on Friday and public speaking gives me the nervous sweats." 

 

Pierce, true to Shirley's threat, says something helpful, "I can help you with that."

 

She doesn't even hesitate to accept. 

 

"Well, we're screwed too. We're three days behind on our biology lab." Troy sits up to explain it to the group. 

 

"The reason it's taking so long is because Troy's afraid-" Abed is cut off. 

 

"I'm not afraid, Abed. I choose not to be around rats because they are unpopular. Same goes for centipedes and lakes." For a second, Abed realises Troy had the same rule in high school. He didn't hang out with Annie because she was unpopular. Not that he says this out loud. Abed knows that's rude. 

 

Someone needs to talk to their teacher. "I vote we all look at Jeff at the same time." 

 

They form a row of expecting faces. Jeff looks up. "In a way, all of you are right." 

 

Eventually Annie convinces Jeff to go talk to Chang. It's a step towards having the weekend free. With that worry lessening, Abed focuses on his big two issues. The first is passing biology. To do that, Troy needs to be a lot less frightened of rats. They've tried getting him used to them, by having him stood outside the room and then inside. He won't go close enough to the rat for it to be able to hear him. 

 

The second problem is Annie. Since she refuses to move in with one of her friends, and can't afford another apartment, she needs to feel safer in her apartment. He can't do anything about the people who live around her. Both problems are difficult and Abed doesn't know how to fix them. 

 

Troy is chatting with him about his football team, unaware that Abed isn't paying attention. Their lab is filled with people, carrying rats around. Troy tenses, automatically stopping outside the classroom. 

 

"Come on, Troy. Fievel is over there." He points, "We need to train him." 

 

He sets the cage on their table. He knows keeping an animal in a cage isn't nice and as soon as the experiment is over, he's freeing Fievel before they can use him as a dissection rat. This is the closest they've gotten Troy to the rat this week, and he's going to make the most of it. 

 

He decides on a song. The one he heard this morning. 

 

"Somewhere, out there." He sings, and Troy stays silent. "Troy, sing. The assignment is to train a rat to respond to a specific song."

 

"Yeah. Did you have to pick a duet?" Abed can sense he's frustrated. That doesn't change the assignment. Their teacher won't allow an extension for a rat-phobia. At Greendale, teachers have heard every excuse. One of the people Abed sits next to claims to have an allergy to paper, so all his homework has to be sent electronically to him. The teacher is probably in his seventies and can't turn on a computer, let alone send an email. This kid never has to work. 

 

Troy bends down to sing with him, since Abed isn't backing down. The lab is too busy for Troy to sing from a distance. "Somewhere out there, beneath the pale moonlight." Fievel stands to attention against the cage, squeaking and twitching.

 

"He did it. Good boy, Fievel. Commencing reward." Pavlov originally carried out this conditioning experiment with dogs. The dogs heard a bell and were then given food. They started salivating when they heard the bell, to prepare for food. Even when they weren't given food, they still salivating once hearing the bell. It helped influence research into the conditioning of animals, like getting a rat to respond to a certain song. The food reinforces the rats. 

 

He warns Troy that he has to open the cage so he can stand back. 

 

"You don't have to warn me, I'm not afr-" He screams "Fraid!" as Betty walks past with a rat, getting dangerously close to Troy. He backs away, hitting the cage and it topples to the ground. Troy screams, jumping onto the table. Abed notices their rat has disappeared. Not only will they fail the assignment, but Fievel is going to end up cat meat. 

 

Leaving Troy screaming on the table, Abed heads off in the direction of the canteen. He assumes the smell of food would draw the attention of the rat. On the way, he knocks on doors to see if anyone has seen it rat. The canteen is clean, food isn't even being served at the moment. Hopefully someone will find Fievel before someone tries to call the exterminator. In Greendale, rats aren't exactly uncommon. Most of these came from the vents to begin with. It saves money and helps keep Greendale clean. 

 

He spends hours searching for Fievel, hoping to find him. While he's searching, he thinks about how to help Annie. His issues with Troy being afraid of Fievel is almost fixed. Without a rat, they'll fail the assignment but Troy wouldn't have to freak out any more. If he can figure out a way to keep Annie safe tonight, it'll be okay. One failed assignment isn't going to ruin his grades or Troy's. As long as they ace the next piece of work, they'll keep their point average. 

 

Ideally, Abed would like Annie to stay with someone tonight. Any one of the group, except Troy, could host Annie for a couple of nights. However, getting Annie to agree to that would be impossible. She's too stubborn to admit she needs a good night sleep and a safe place to live. So someone needs to stay with her. He could ask Britta to go over for a impromptu sleepover but it might end with the entire group knowing about her situation. Plus, no one actually knows where Annie lives. She keeps that a secret. 

 

After hours of thinking and rat-hunting, Abed's ready to give up. He's searching the dorm blocks, considering whether rats have good enough senses of smell to go to Abed's apartment. Dogs do that. He doubts rats would either. There's no sign of a rat around his apartment. It would take little Fievel a while to get to the dorm blocks. Someone would have seen him. It occurs to him that eventually, Fievel will get hungry. His hunger will draw him out of whatever hole he's hiding in. The search, much like a missing person, needs to be postponed for twenty-four hours. 

 

Lying on his table, is the entire box set for Indian Jones. He's been meaning to show Annie them for a while. He smiles, picking up the set and putting them into his bag. Tonight is as good a night as any. 

 

++++++

 

Annie is sat working on her Spanish essay in the library. She's five pages in, stretching the paragraphs out with additional topics. She slides a paragraph on animals into it, adding a linking sentence about authority and pandering in the animal kingdom. She needs the library because her textbooks only cover colors, animals and college words. She can keep in a lot about teaching and learning Spanish, but even that won't stretch to twenty pages. 

 

She's packing away, ready to go home before it gets dark when she sees Abed. He looks a little nervous, or worried. She knows his biology rat went missing. He hasn't found Fievel yet then. That's a shame. She knows Abed really liked him. She feels guilty she didn't offer to help, but she will tomorrow. Or she'll just help with his essay so he can spend more time searching. 

 

"Hey." She says, standing up to meet him. She squeezes his arm, "No luck finding him?" 

 

He shakes his head and shrugs, "I'll find him tomorrow." 

 

"Can I help?" Annie offers, putting the last of her textbooks into her bag. It's the one Abed gave to her after they met, at the first Spanish group session. She was so annoyed he hasn't invited her, but she understood it was keeping her in the dark. Abed isn't one to lie. 

 

"I was hoping to watch Indian Jones tonight." Abed says quietly, considerate of the people working around them, "But I can't get my DVD player to work." 

 

Unless it's to help her. She wasn't born yesterday. It's obvious that Abed is trying to help her, but she doesn't need his help. She might be terrified of being in her home today, but she doesn't need a babysitter to keep her company. She needs to face her fears. 

 

"Abed-" She starts but he cuts her off. 

 

"Please, Annie. It would help me feel better." He sounds so genuine, it's difficult to imagine he's lying when his tone stays the same, he doesn't blink or look away. He looks her straight in the eyes; his brown eyes never leaving hers. It's unfair of Annie to tell him about all the things in her neighbourhood that frighten her, and not expect him to worry. She assumed Abed never worried. Not because he's unfeeling or not a good friend, but because he seems fearless. Nothing bothers him. Unlike Annie. he's strong. He's there for her. The least she can do is accept the help and be grateful to have someone who cares about her.

 

 "Okay. I'd love to watch them with you. How would you get back to campus?" She doesn't give him a chance to make up an excuse of why he has to stay over, "You can stay. That way we can watch them all." 

 

"Okay." Abed says, trying not to smile, "I suppose I can stay." 

 

They head out of the library, "Let me guess. You already have a bag packed?" 

 

Abed shrugs his shoulders, "I like to be prepared." 

 

She laughs, relieved to be spending the night with someone, and bumps her shoulder to his. Or more like his elbow. She forgets often he's taller than her. 

 

"Fievel will turn up. Those lab cages are like a three star motel compared to most of Greendale." She jokes, although there's a colony of bacteria living under the east stairway that seems to thrive in the environment. In a year or two, they might actually have to rename the college 'Envirodale' as it will be colonised by new mutated creatures. 

 

They walk in silence for a while. She's too tired to make even polite conversation. It's not needed with Abed. There's something she's been meaning to talk to him for a while. 

 

"Abed. Remember when you told me to call my Mom?" He continues to walk, "Well, I couldn't. I tried and I just couldn't bring myself to talk to her. But the other day she called. I was in class and I missed it. I don't know if I would have picked it up." 

 

She waits for Abed to say something but he doesn't. "She left me a message, telling me to call my Dad because he's worried about me. Nothing else. I... I want to hate her. Is that awful of me?" 

 

She's never admitted that aloud. Her feeling towards her Mother have been a secret for years. Her Mother taught her how to hide her emotions well. She doesn't hate her but she's also never going to forgive her. For everything she put her though. Not once did she visit her in rehab. It was her Mother who locked the door when she needed help the most. How can love be that conditional? How could her Mother only care when Annie could take care of herself? Annie doesn't have children, but she'd be damned if she ever blamed a child for making a mistake that ruined her life. 

 

She looks at Abed, scared to see his reaction. Not ruined, she reminds herself, derailed. Greendale has been good for her. She's made wonderful friends and she's never been grateful enough for the track she fell onto. That doesn't mean she hates it there. 

 

She always felt as though she wasn't good enough and that her own Mother couldn't love someone like her. To have to earn her Mother's love was the worst kind of loss. Because she knows it's her fault in the first place, and fundamentally she cannot ever change enough to be someone worth loving. You cannot let go and accept it. 

 

"You're not awful, Annie." Abed finally says, "You don't owe your Mother love for being your Mother. When I was a kid, I thought I hated my Mom too. For leaving. But I was always so happy when she came to visit." 

 

Hearing her Mother's voice does not fill Annie's heart with joy, it just hurts to remember. She's tired of being the little girl desperate for her Mother's approval. There's nothing wrong with her. Not even the drug addiction was so bad as to hate her for it. Her Father knew how her Mom treated her but did nothing about it. He never worried about her back then, why should she comfort him now. 

 

"I feel it." Annie says, "But I also don't. I didn't think that was possible. To be your own contradiction." 

 

They turn around the corner to her apartment. "Did you still hate your Mom for leaving?" 

 

"I don't think so." He answers. 

 

"I wish I has a Mom like Shirley. She loves her boys. She was showing me pictures of Elijah and Jordan. She kept telling me how proud she was and how big they'd grown since they were little. My Mom never even took photos of me." 

 

Abed nods, "Your Mother is proud of you. Mom's are meant to want the best for you. Sometimes you disagree on what's best." 

 

They reach her apartment. Abed hasn't mentioned the rough area. A few cars pass by, usually creaking their way forward. The air is heavy with exhaust fumes. Her hands are shaking when she puts her key into the lock, clipping the metal together. Abed puts his hand on her shoulder and she opens up the door. The apartment is spotless, perfect for guests. She's glad, mess bothers her. Not for the first time, she considers getting a dog so there's someone to guard the door. Handling and looking after a dog would be too hard at the moment. 

 

"You can take my bed. I'll take the couch . We can have pasta for dinner or pizza or I could make noodles? It's up to you. Would you like a coffee? Or tea? I have regular or camomile or peppermint? Or-" 

 

"Regular tea is good, thank you. I'll help you." He drops his bag by his shoes, keeping it close to the wall so it doesn't look out of place. She knows she's fussing, but she can't help it. It gives her something else to think about it. Abed couldn't exactly fight off an intruder, but not having to be alone makes her feel better. 

 

They make tea and Annie grabs blankets to sleep on the couch, although Abed insists he's not taking her bed. Her TV is small, but Annie has a feeling neither of them are going to care too much. She makes tea and buttered noodles. They're easy to make. They watch half of the first one while eating their food and Annie quickly washes them up while Abed makes another cup of tea for them both. 

 

"Do you mind if I put on pyjamas? I'm getting a little chilly and there's no heating, sorry." 

 

Abed shrugs. "No problem." 

 

Her pyjamas are pink and polka dotted. She hides behind her wardrobe door to change, pulling her hair from the clips to let it hang loose. She sits back on the couch, pulling a blanket over her legs to keep warm and pauses the movie to let Abed get changed. He brought pyjamas with him. They've got stars on them, which looks really cool. She pushes the blanket over him too, and they sit together on the couch, watching the movie about a man who cares far too much about old stuff. 

 

++++ 

 

Abed has watched Indiana Jones more times then he can count but tonight, he cannot concentrate. Annie's legs and arms are pressed against his, separated only by cotton pyjamas. Her hair has already curled naturally. She's fighting her tiredness, but eventually her head rests against his shoulder and her eyes close. Carefully, he tries to cover her with the blanket and get up to let her lie down. As his arm moves, Annie leans back against his arm, stopping him from moving. 

 

For a while, he sits there quietly, Annie curled up next to him. He brushes the hair from her face, loosely winding it around his fingers and letting it fall back down in locks of curls. He tries to move again but she stirs and he stops himself. He wants her to have a restful night sleep, without being disturbed. Tiredness from last night catches up with him, and he rests his head against Annie's, falling asleep the second he lets his eyes close. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Longest chapter to make up for the late of updating. New chapter being posted soon.


	11. The Politics of Human Sexuality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annie works through her emotions. Abed avoid them by challenging Troy to beat him at sport.

Annie wakes up, and it takes a minute to figure out where she is and who's arm is around her. Abed is sleeping next to her, and she's lying against his shoulder. For a second, she freaks out. She was not supposed to fall asleep here with Abed and it's embarrassing. She takes a deep breath, focusing on how nice this is rather than the horror of being so vulnerable. It's too early to wake Abed without it being rude, so she lies there looking up at the ceiling. 

What Annie needs is a distraction for the things happening around here. If she's not focused on her apartment, she won't be afraid of it. She'll go see the Dean and there must be an extracurricular activity she can throw herself into. Organisation or  managing preferred, as she can work on it at home. She's on top of all her courses at Greendale and there's only so much subject-based extra credit you can get. Without psychology, she's got time free. 

Abed stirs, his arm moving. Her fingers brush against her hips and she holds her breath, almost smiling. He looks so different asleep. Younger. Less animated. His usual confused frown is replaced with something calmer. She could almost go back to sleep again. Without an alarm, she might sleep through her first class. Even though it's early, it's the longest night sleep Annie has had in a long time and she'd love for it to last.  She closes her eyes. 

After a few calm few minutes, she whispers, "Abed?" And again louder when he doesn't wake up, "Abed?" 

He sits up too quickly, pushing her forward. "Abed!" She feels bad, "Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you." 

He blinks, running his hands through his hair to push it out his eyes. "Annie?" 

"Yeah. You slept over at mine, remember?" She's close to laughing at how out of it he is. He's been too kind for her to laugh a him. There's no amount of Indiana Jones DVDs that can make up for how understanding he's been over the last few weeks. 

"It's not even light yet." He grumbles, pulling them both back down to lie on the couch. "Go back to sleep." 

He wraps his arms around her, and she rests back against him, the blanket around their legs. "I'm sorry you didn't sleep well." 

His eyes remain close. He's got beautiful dark, long eye-lashes. She thinks he's fallen asleep again when he speaks. "I slept fine." He sighs. "Do you have to get up?" 

"Not really." She sighs against him, "I just feel I should do something." The motivation to get up and get ready for college disappears in the hazy morning. 

"Did you sleep well?" he asks, and she nods. He must feel her moving. "Good." 

"Are you going to the Green Day concert tonight?" She almost forgot about the Dean's promise. Jeff could be right, and there's a high change they won't show. For now, she's remaining optimistic. Even if the band don't turn up, there's people and food and another college experience. 

"If I find Fievel." 

"I have a couple frees today. I can help you look." She offers, feeling better to be talking rather than just lying here. Coffee would be nice though. It would mean moving out of this cosy space between pillows and Abed and she's not sure it's worth it. 

"Thanks, Annie." He says, opening his eyes and meeting hers. He smiles gently, and brushing his knuckles over her cheek. She can feel her heart beat increase, her breathing falters as she looks at him. She bites her lip and he moves, the room so silent all she can hear is their breathing and her pulse. She raises her head so they're face to face. 

Annie's phone starts to ring, scaring her and making Abed jump. Both of them break away and Annie grabs her screaming phone from her table. Britta calling. She answers it. 

"Britta? It's not even seven yet." The last time Britta was awake before seven was Greendale's early bird class. It counted for 50% of the extra credit you needed for the year. The entire group said they'd attend (except for Shirley who had to take her boys to school). Only Abed, Annie, and Britta turned up. Jeff 'forgot', Troy and Pierce slept in. Britta downed seven cups of coffee within two hours and vowed never to go back. 

Annie gets up, leaving Abed and pretending like that was normal. Like she was not thinking about kissing Abed, her best friend. 

"I thought I'd surprise my friend Abed with breakfast. But he's not at his apartment." Britta sounded overly smug. "Any idea where he might be?" 

"He fell asleep here, watching a movie." Annie whispers, refusing to let Abed hear this. She cannot believe Britta would go out of her way to prove something is going on rather than trusting Annie. Nothing is going on. Right? Abed is sat up on the couch, folding the blanket.

"I'm not buying it." 

Annie groans, "Leave it, Britta. Please. I've got to go." She doesn't want the group to find out about her home yet. It's not something she wants public. They'd offer to help and she doesn't want that chance. It's too temping. It's difficult to remember she wants independence here, and this apartment represents Annie coping on her own. The door shuts to the bathroom. Okay, almost cope on her own. 

"See you in class, Mrs Nadir." Britta hangs up, likely angry that Annie isn't sharing with her. She hates lying to her friends. It's the worse kind of feeling. 

Annie in a fit of frustration, throws her phone onto the couch, it bounces off and falls to the floor. Tears well up in her eyes. Do not cry, she warns herself. You are not allowed to cry about this. Not even for a minute. Liar, she tells herself as her eyes water. 

"Annie?" Abed's quiet voice shakes her out of her fears, "Are you okay?" 

She presses her lips together, her fingers curled into tight fists as she tries to stay strong. She turns slowly, blinking her eyes and trying not to think about Britta. It's silly gossip; Britta isn't going to be mad at you. You're not sleeping with Abed. You're not interested in him. She nods yes to Abed. 

"Was that Britta?" He checks. The walls aren't exactly soundproof. 

"Yeah."  She doesn't want to talk about it. She can't say Britta suspects something. That's a conversation she doesn't want to have right now. Things are too complicated. 

Thankfully, Abed doesn't ask. Annie's stomach turns at the thought of talking to Britta, and she calms down that she doesn't have to lie completely. Abed came over to watch Indiana Jones, and they fell asleep. Nothing has happened and nothing will. She's not interested in him in that way. Actually, she's never had interest in anyone in  _that_  way. Her attraction to Troy was romantic, rather than sexual. She could never have a casual relationship, especially with Abed. 

Annie convinces herself that wanting to kiss him was a simple misunderstanding. She felt close to him at that moment. It doesn't mean she has feelings for him. It felt domestic, and new. 

She seriously needs a distraction. 

****** 

 

He almost kissed her. Abed takes a few shaky breaths as he gets dressed, pretending like he wasn't a second away from making a mistake that could have ruined everything. 

He's seen movies where the friend tries to get the girl. It never works out. He falls for the beautiful lead girl, pines over her for the entire movie, and she goes to the guy who saves her from monsters. The handsome one who can talk to people. The normal one. He isn't normal. 

This was a terrible idea. 

***** 

A week later and Annie is seven feet in plans for the upcoming STD fair. She asked Dean Pelton what upcoming events she could help out this. The nearest one was the STD fair, which originally was going to be a stall outside with leaflets. Annie, within a minute, had brought that up to a whole evening of education. She'd plan the entire thing for him, and he could take all the credit.

The Dean didn't mind having someone run the event. It gave Annie something to focus her energy on. She'd work until she was too tired to care about possible murderers. Britta had dropped her suspicion after Annie brought up her strange behaviour around Jeff recently. 

Annie even designed t-shirts for the event. 

The only slight issue; Annie knows nothing about sex. 

She had it. Once. In high school. Her and her boyfriend had been in a closet and they been kissing and got undressed. The entire event lasted less than one Madonna song and he'd cried a lot. It wasn't a surprise when he broke it off and came out a month later. Annie wasn't upset or disappointed. She'd not even sure it counted as sex and never tried it again. The idea of it has always made her uncomfortable. Taking off her clothes, being out of control, messing up her hair. It makes her cringe. She is in no rush to try it again, not even with someone who likes girls. 

The most passionate feeling she'd ever had was with Jeff, when she'd kissed him to win the debate. That was fake too. None of it mattered when it was over. It felt nice with Jeff. He's a good kisser. She's pretty sure that's now how attraction is supposed to feel, but it was close. 

She stops that trail of thought before it leads down the path to last week. The fair has distracted her from her apartment, but it didn't help her to stop thinking about last week and what almost happened in Abed's arms. 

Annie sees the Dean across the court yard and runs to give him an update about the fair. He looks funky in the t-shirt she made him, that matches hers. 

"So I booked a sketch artist, an improve troupe, and there'll be a laser projecting a burning pelvis onto the ceiling!" She is too excited to care to that she just said pelvis to her Dean. 

"A laser!" She's so glad he sounds excited. "Well, this isn't gonna be your mother's sexually transmitted disease awareness fair.   
You've been quite the little helper, Annie." 

She notices Troy and Abed walking back. Although she's been texting updates to Abed about it, she still hands them both a flyer. She cares that they toss them straight into the bin but they'll both be there to support her. Abed has promised to bring the entire group. Luckily, it won't take much to get them there. 

Britta and Jeff walk past and Annie stops them to give them both a flyer. "Catch knowledge!" It was her idea to have a catch phrase. The focus on this fair is knowing how to be safe, rather than telling people not to do it. States that teach abstinence tend to have higher STD and teen pregnancy rates. Kids aren't taught how to be safe. Most of the people who go to Greendale are old enough to have sex, and a lot still don't know how to be safe. 

"Sorry, not interested...." He catches sight of Sabrina, wearing a STD hoodie. "In ignoring your very important cause." Jeff walks back towards her. He's so transparent. She should have made the logo a pair of breasts, then he'd be offering to hang up banners. 

Britta and Jeff are going to breakfast. They seem to be doing a lot of 'casual friend' activities lately. Not that Annie would ever pressure Britta into telling her about Jeff. Or sneakily visiting Jeff's apartment in the early morning to see if he's home. 

"The cafeteria's closed while we set up for the fair." Annie cuts in, before Jeff can whisk her helper away. She needs all the help she can get right now, as they're on a tight schedule. Flirting is not on that schedule. "Fortune cookie?"  There's an excellent restaurant Annie eats at a lot that made her up a bunch for free. They're lovely there and the food is good. She should take Abed there soon. Jeff takes a cookie. 

"You know the toilets in the women's bathrooms don't have seats, right?" Britta says, making a good point. It's a serious issue. Maybe after the fair, Annie can work with the Dean to improve the limited facilities. For instance, the gym has a pool table, yet their Spanish textbooks are covered in racist slurs from 1986 when they were first printed.

"Because they keep getting stolen." That shouldn't make a difference. Anything not directly built into a wall or floor is stolen on a regular basis. " Sabrina, take a note. I want hidden cameras in every stall." 

Another terrible idea from the Dean. Sabrina won't take note. "Problem solved." Britta says sarcastically as they walk away. 

"You will get aids." Jeff reads aloud in an unimpressed tone. 

Annie wanted the shock factor in the cookies, "Flip it over." 

"Unless you go to the STD fair." 

She leaves the two of them to think about the dangers of unprotected sex while she hands out the rest of her flyers. She could use some help, but the group is busy. Shirley has business work to do, and Abed and Troy are playing basketball. Jeff might help if she got Sabrina to come with her and ask. It seem a little mean. After all, Jeff doesn't care about the fair and Sabrina isn't going to date him for handing out flyers. 

"Catch knowledge!" She hands a guy a poster, and he takes it, giving it a quick read before reading her shirt too.  He's older than her, easily in his early thirties. She doesn't recognise him from any of her classes. 

"Sex talks, huh? Any demonstrations, sweetie?" The guy takes a step closer, his eyes still on her shirt. She folds her arms and backs away. "Wouldn't mind a practise with a pretty young girl like you." 

"Ugh!" She says, feeling exposed. 

"Come on, love. Take the compliment." He smirks, refusing to back away from her. She keeps walking backwards, totally creeped out by him until she walks into someone. Turning around, she sees Troy and Abed standing behind her . Both look angrily at the man harassing her.

"Dude, back off." Troy says, "She doesn't want to talk to you." 

The guy doesn't move for a moment, and Annie hopes he doesn't cause a fight. They're both standing in front of her protectively.

"Okay, Christ, I was just being friendly." He leaves with a group of friends, and Annie sighs with relief. She can't stand men like that. 

"Thank you." She tells Abed and Troy, who are looking at her with concern. 

"Are you okay?" Abed asks, and Annie smiles. 

"Fine." She lies easily, ignoring her thudding heart in her chest. That freaked her out. 

Troy's glaring in the direction he went. "You coming to study group? We'll walk you." 

Annie spots Shirley across the green. "It's okay, thank you. I've got to talk to Shirley." She rushes to catch up to Shirley. She's grateful to have Abed and Troy help her out but they wouldn't understand being approached by a guy. That's something women have to deal with. 

"Shirley!" Annie calls as she reaches her, "How do you deal with weird guys?" 

Shirley looks concerned, "Are you okay, Annie? Is someone bothering you?" 

"Someone was just staring at me and wouldn't leave me alone. Troy and Abed got him to leave. It's like the fifth time since I started planning the STD fair that some guy has hit on me. In a rude way." Mostly by staring at her breasts. Or by telling her they' like to catch her. One guy even asked if STD stood for suck-the-dick. 

"You poor soul." Shirley says, hugging Annie tightly, "I'm so sorry." 

Annie's not used to getting attention from guys. When she had braces and frizzy hair, no one talked to her. The  closest she got to being hit on or asked on a date was when someone asked if they could sit next to her on the bus because there were no seats left. Hardly romantic. 

"How do you get them to leave you alone, Shirley?" Annie asks, wanting the advice of another women. Shirley smiles, taking her hand as they head for the study room quietly. 

"Annie, baby, I haven't had to deal with that in years. You know why?" Annie shakes her head, "I already have two men at my side to scare them off. My boys." 

 

Annie laughs, "You're saying to get pregnant?" 

 

"Heavens no." Shirley squeezes her hand, "I saying to stay with someone. Britta and I are always here to help. The boys are happy to help with the STD fair too if you want help." They're at the study room and Annie hasn't noticed any comments, even in her STD shirt. Pleased with the method of repelling morons, Annie clutches her bag straps and heads into the room. The group has already taken their usual seats. 

"Hey, guys, Jeff and I are double-dating tonight with my new girlfriend." Annie feels a little down-hearted to hear Jeff has a new girlfriend she doesn't know about. Not that it matters who Jeff dates. They haven't mentioned the kiss since it happened. 

Her mind drifts to Abed and last week. They haven't spoken much since, but she makes a special effort to catch his eye and smile. She never meant to fall asleep with him. It's so unlike her to have been that relaxed. She thinks of Abed as laid back, but she never considered it might be a good influence on her. He's given her some brilliant ideas about the fair. She's been sleeping alone for the last week, but she actually misses Abed. Twice she's fallen asleep on the couch, instead of in bed. She's re-watched Indian Jones twice when she couldn't sleep and text Abed her favourite parts. 

Jeff looks bored, "You got that from 'I doubt it'?" 

Shirley sounds especially excited. Her two boys don't help much when trying to avoid Pierce's sexual advancements. "Pierce has got a girlfriend!" Her smile is wide and Piece seems excited to brag about his date. The escort. Annie doesn't have a problem with escorts, but she's only met one once. She was a sweet young girl at her therapy sessions, who had gotten addicted to drugs. 

While the group chats about Jeff's date, Annie finds herself thinking about today's fair. It has to go perfectly. The Dean is counting on her to make this the best STD fair that has ever happened at Greendale. It shouldn't be too hard. Last year two extremists came in to talk about how abstinence was vital to a healthy life, because opening your genitals allowed demons to crawl inside you. Annie only heard about the horrors from high school, and immediately scoffed how that didn't surprise her. A year later, and here she is.

 

Okay, she's not where she wanted to be. But no one is. A year ago Jeff was a lawyer. Shirley was married and Britta was saving the Earth. Troy was the most popular boy in school. Pierce was a year younger. And Abed...Is he happier than he was a year ago? For all they talk, Abed encloses little about his past to her. It's not secretive so much as a disinterest. As though he cannot bare to talk about something as boring as his childhood. Annie suspects there's more to it than that but doesn't push. 

 

They all have their secrets. 

 

*********

Troy and Abed offer to help Annie set up the STD fair. She's been hanging banners all morning, and the last time Abed saw her she looked stressed. The gang- minus Pierce and Jeff- are there, setting down food and baskets of condoms. There's balloons everywhere, and everything sparkles brightly. The place looks great, but Annie isn't in sight. He spots Britta about to leave, and stops her quickly. 

 

"Britta, have you seen Annie?" She looks a weird at his question. He hopes he hasn't made her uncomfortable. Then he remembers the overheard phone call last week, and that Britta thinks there's something going on between him and Annie. 

 

Since they fell asleep together, Abed has tried his best not to think of her. Annie is not who he should like. He should find a dorky girl who wears glasses or a boy with great fashion sense. That's how the story goes. It ends with Annie and the handsome masculine man, and they're all happy. He's being realistic. There are no outcomes where Annie chooses him. 

 

Maybe that's made him determined to win today. It helps Troy really hates losing and gets frustrated easily. Abed feels secure enough with their friendship that he's not actually annoyed. Troy's blowing up condoms for fun in the corner. 

 

"She's dealing with an issue." Britta finally replies, running her had through her hair. Her cheeks have gone a little pink. 

 

"Is she okay?" Abed checks, concerned by the face Britta is making. She's difficult to read at times. 

 

Britta smiles, "She's fine. Having a little boy trouble. I'm sure she'll tell you about it later." She walks off laughing, without seeing the reaction from Abed. Boy trouble? Which boy? Jeff,Troy, or someone else? Troy calls out Abed's name, but he doesn't turn around. He needs to wait here for Britta to come back an explain what she meant. There's an explanation. If there was a boy in Annie's life she would have told him. 

 

Troy is talking to him, stood inches away and waving his hand in front of his face. "Hey, have you crashed or something?" 

 

Abed blinks and turns slowly to face him, "Want to play a game?" There are plenty around. Most have hidden STD messages the person has to repeat when the player wins or loses. Annie spend the last few night sending Abed ideas like 'Bad at guarding? Guard your genitals with a condom.' and 'Feeling down? Get aroused safely for a real high!' 

 

There are lava lamps covering tables and the DJ is setting up in the corner. The place is starting to get busy with people expected the party to start early. Annie and the Dean have done an excellent job setting this place up and organising it. Annie is not around to enjoy it. People are mingling, and Abed finds himself lost in the crowd as he walks to the game station with Troy. He searches for Annie. She's not here. 

 

Troy brings him back to reality by passing him a handful of balls, "First to win a bear wins." There's a poster attached to the stall that reads, 'Want normal balls? Catch knowledge at the STD fair!' 

 

Abed tosses the ball and it bounces straight into the hole. He doesn't have the heart to celebrate, ignoring Troy's scream of frustration. He's watching Troy take his own shot and thinks he sees Annie but it's just a short brunette handing out posters with information on. 

 

He makes the next four shots without a mistake. Troy only gets one of his five in. The women running the stall hands over a giant bear. It's soft and Abed remembers wanting one just like it as a kid. 

 

"I can't believe you beat me again!" Troy grumbles, sulking off into the crowd of people. The place is alive with music and dancing. Abed feels he should say sorry for winning again. 

 

"Do you want my stuffed animal?" He offers, assuming Troy would like it. He stops, looking like he wants to punch Abed. Abed can tell by his expression. People at school used to make it before they hit him. 

 

"We're arm wrestling." He angrily clears the table of leaflets and flexes his arm. Most people don't arm wrestle with him. They think he's weak because he doesn't play sport. 

 

He considers letting Troy win. He's won enough games today. His mind drifts back to Annie, and how she has boy troubles. It can't be Troy, he's been with him all day. Unless that's the problem. They haven't spoken today. He cannot blame Troy for Annie felt about him. How he wishes Annie felt the same way for him but doesn't. He pushes Troy's hand into the table, celebrating to the crowd surrounding them. When the moment is over, he apologises to Troy for hurting his hand. 

 

Hauling around the giant stuffed bear, Abed and Troy go get a drink from the bar. An non-alcoholic drink since neither of them can have alcohol. A few- very drunk-girls come up to the two of them. They want to dance. Abed lets Troy walk them both to the dancing area, while he checks his phone. 

 

ONE MISSED CALL: ANNIE EDISON 

 

He immediately calls back but there's no answer. So he rings Britta instead. She picks up. 

 

"Abed, what's wrong?" Britta answers. 

 

"Are you with Annie?" He asks, having to yell over the music. 

 

"No." Britta says, "She walked off. We can't find her." 

 

"Okay. Thanks." Abed hangs up the phone. Glancing back at Troy, who seems just fine on his own, he heads out into the corridors of Greendale. If Annie walked away from Britta, for whatever reason, she'll have already started to feel guilty. Which means she'll go to the Study room. Where she feels close to her friends. 

 

Sure enough, he sees her sat at her usual space at the table. The lights are off, and she's not moving. Just sat staring forward into the dark room. 

 

"Annie." Abed says quietly, but she still jumps slightly. He sits across from her, at his own seat and waits for her to speak. 

 

"You won a bear." She says softly, looking at the giant animal hanging from his fingers. He drops it onto the floor. 

 

"It's a great STD fair." He doesn't mention the amount of students getting drunk. 

 

Annie's eyes light up, "Really? Did you learn a lot?" 

 

He nods slowly, "Why aren't you there? Spreading knowledge." 

 

Annie falls silent. He doesn't think she's going to tell him. "The Dean wants me to put a comdom on a... you know. But I can't." 

 

Boy troubles. He's relieved and instantly relaxes that he doesn't have to comfort her about another boy. She continues, "It's not that I don't know how. Theoretically, I'm an expert. It's just not something I'd feel comfortable doing. I'll mess it up. And it's an accurate model. I've never..."  She trails off. "I'm hiding." 

 

"You sound unhappy." 

 

"Of course I'm unhappy, Abed. It's embarrassing. Shirley has two children. Britta has definitely been with guys. Everyone already thinks I'm some little girl who can't handle herself and they're right. I'm practically a...v-word. People would throw me into a volcano to make sacrifices to their Gods." 

 

It takes Abed a minute to understand what she's saying. "You're not a little girl. You organised this fair independently. Just because you can't put a condom on a penis model, it doesn't mean you're young." 

 

Annie nods, trying to agree with what he's saying but he can see she's miles into her thoughts. "There's nothing to be ashamed of. Tell the Dean he should do it, as a role model to the college." 

 

He wants to help, but he finds himself thinking about nothing but her. Talking about sex isn't helping him not imagine what it would be like to kiss Annie. He look away from her, his hands clasped together on his lap. His phone vibrates in his pocket and he checks it, leaving Annie to decide what to do. It's Troy, asking Abed where he went and challenging him to a race. 

 

"I've got to go, Annie." Liar. "You're a grown up, independent women who has nothing to be ashamed of." He leaves the room, a weight in his stomach telling him he should be a better friend. But he can't be a good friend until he stops liking Annie. So that's what he'll have to do. 

 

********* 

 

Annie lies down on the couch and lets tears run down her cheeks. She'll never be looked at as anything other than a child. A little girl with a big mouth who ruined her life over a stupid mistake. A realisation about why she's crying hits her, and she curls up in pain. She's nothing but a stupid girl with a stupid crush on a boy. Her best friend. Abed is never going to like her and throwing herself into work didn't stop her feeling the way she does about him. She's never felt so helpless. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long update, it's exam season! Hope the chapter is worth the wait... Thanks for the ongoing support.

**Author's Note:**

> I scripted the speeches and lines taken from the show myself, any mistakes I make are entirely my own. 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed reading.


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